


Song of the Banshee

by rotrude



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Arthur Pendragon Returns, Arthurian legend - Freeform, Dystopia, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Modern Era, Post-Canon, myths and legends, scarification as memory aid
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-19
Updated: 2015-04-19
Packaged: 2018-03-24 19:05:58
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 29,136
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3780976
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rotrude/pseuds/rotrude
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for the Tavern_Tales theme of the month:  Soul Bonds, Destiny, Meant to Be. Merlin has to fend for himself in a world he doesn't understand and can't remember from day to day. Until a man comes back who claims to know him better than he does himself, a man who stirs something in Merlin that makes no sense, unless what he's saying is true.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Song of the Banshee

The Banshee lifts the cup and circles the rim with blood stained fingers. As the sound grows in pitch and volume, concentric circles mar the surface of the water in the vessel.

Her voice joins the chorus, merges with the sound, weaves in and out of it until it becomes one with it. The melody becomes a chant of power, one that finds its roots in the earth and the air, in fire and water.

Winds carry it to the people of earth; the oceans push it on its shores and feed it up its rivers, into streams and lakes. Fire forges the song into weapons, moulds it into objects, objects that go into buildings, until the very frame of them radiates its notes. Water drenches human bodies with it, is subsumed into them, tangles the strain into their very being.

The tangles find root in the vast expanse of the earth and take possession of everything. Everything but a stern core of opposition, a ruthless wall of a soul. The Banshee knows that soul as she knows the sun and earth and sky. It's as imperishable as time. But unlike time it's tarnished, its brightness dimming, the fire that once fed it steadily dwindling. A part of it is missing. This soul can be no shore to the chant's tide, no dam.

The Banshee sweetens the song, like honey flowing in the rivers of the body, like a lullaby a mother sings to her son. She gives it her all until the music is pure beauty, gentle comfort, enticing and welcoming both.

The ancient soul welcomes the notes inside its bounds, the peace of them. The soul feeds off them and lets them twine with its essence, binding itself to the strings of its power. The soul has forfeited the fight for earth, and is no longer its guarantor and protector.

With the last bulwark of resistance gone, the Banshee's song sweeps across the planet and makes it its own possession.

The song gathers momentum, goes back to being the piercing wail it's meant to be. It pervades the world. It's the shriek of the Banshee. It's the song that she was forever meant to sing, her caoineadh. It's the wail of undoing.

When the song ends, she puts the cup down, turns around. In her bare feet she pads towards the circle. “Is the end nigh?” she asks.

“No, this is not the end but a new beginning” the Bodachs, grey and hooded as they stand in a circle, say. “This is how we rule.”

 

****

 

To the dull sound of the tightening rope, the squirrel runs into the snare. A squeal, sharp and high-pitched fills Merlin's senses, turns his stomach.

Picking up a stick, Merlin approaches the animal. The snare has it. The little beast twitches and chitters, wriggles frantically. It jerks its free leg, squirms, twists upon itself.

Merlin lifts the stick right above his head. He curls his fingers at the base of it, gripping the weapon tight. A tide like sickness sweeps him off his feet. He breathes, rearranges his palm around the base of the bat, closes his eyes.

Merlin pictures the spit, the crackling of a well-fed fire. He can smell the fragrant smell of herbs and taste the taste of moist, tender meat. He anticipates catching the familiar flavours of tarragon and sorrel on his tongue. He fancies he's breaking the food down with his teeth till the juices flood his mouth, dissecting the texture. He tries to imagine what being full feels like. But it doesn't work quite like that. Running on empty as it does, his stomach cramps, clenches in upon itself. It steeps itself in its own juices, burns with them, and he nearly doubles over.

He has to. He must. The muscles in his upper arms clench in preparation for the strike. But then the creature makes a soft, wailing noise and Merlin meets its eyes. They're brown and deep and small and full of fear. He can make it his own, understand it. He can let it burrow deep under his skin and paint his world dark with it.

He drops the stick. It clatters noisily to the ground.

Merlin hunkers down and, with fingers that shake, loosens the noose of rope tied around the animal's taut leg. Once the squirrel is free, it chirps and skitters off into the bowels of a husk of a building.

With no nourishment coming from the traps he laid, Merlin sets out to gather herbs. By the wayside, he finds some rosemary bushes. They must have belonged to some hedge that was last trimmed decades ago and whose shape is no longer easily traced. They've gone wild but they're still good enough.

As he plods homewards, he spots a few blighted dill plants at the base of the metal bridge arching towards the Dome. He plucks the base leaves only because the ones at the top are stained with pale spots and eaten away by rot at the edge. He knows to avoid cherry laurel leaves because they're poisonous. He doesn't know who told him, or how long ago. He just has it down as a fact he doesn't want to question. He does, however, stash some mint into his pouch.

When it's nearly half full with herbs, he lets his muscle memory take him home. On the way over, he makes a point of not looking at anyone.

Aside from the people in the trades and the well-off dwelling in the country, the only ones who loiter in the streets are those with the vacant eyes and tired shuffle of the Benighted.

Even so, he can't help but see groups of women huddled on the steps of crumbling houses, their eyes tracking nothingness. He can't avoid catching of a glimpse of the old men squatting in back alleys, hiding their sightlesness in the dark of the side-streets.

Merlin clenches his fists and doubles his pace and yet he's in time to hear someone call out, “Merlin.”

It's a voice that's neither deep nor high. It's warm and yet haughty, hope and sadness mixing in its tones.

And yet it can't be Merlin's name that's being called. It can't be. No one knows it. No one can. It's a trick of his imagination, like the voices he can sometimes hear in his head only, or the objects that seem to move from out the corners of his eyes, the glow they emanate. The voice isn't something he ought to pay heed to, lest he lose his mind.

Merlin springs into a jog he keeps up until his breath comes harshly and his heart is drumming in his ears. He only slows when it looks as if it's about to swallow him whole. He can afford to anyway. He's no longer hearing his name being called.

At a slower pace, he moves north, then west, past the old Wall and towards the old temple at Spitalfields. A low brick building faces the belfry. Its windows are boarded up and one of the steps is missing. But Merlin calls the place home. His body memory tells him it is so. This is where he lays himself down at night and this is where he wakes up in the morning.

There's no key. He doubts many people of his ilk have keys. He wouldn't feel right owning them. He's nearly up the steps to the front door, when he hears a moan. It's raw and low and very real. Not animal, can't be.

Merlin freezes in the shadow of the door, scans the area around him. Beside a single file of workers making their way home, there's no one around.

A dry raspy sound like the scratch of sandpaper on hardwood echoes down the street. It could easily be someone coughing. It quickly fades but not before Merlin has come to terms with the fact that there's someone there. He just needs to find out who and what they want from him.

His heart beating faster, Merlin descends the steps and finds himself wishing he hadn't dropped the stick he'd meant to kill the squirrel with.

Somehow, he has a feeling he isn't very good at self-defence and, if that's what's required now, the next ten minutes aren't going to be a ball for him. Something inside him quickens and shifts. His fingers prickle and his eyes scald as if someone's breathing fire in his face. He'd question what this is, what is happening to him, but he's got a different priority now.

He looks deep into the bowels of a darkening street. A rat scuttles past. It's fat and black and its tail is long and pointed, trailing low on the ground. Not the source. That scratchy moan was human. Merlin's sure it was.

With nothing to see there, he pivots, goes left, slowly moving towards the end of the row of houses. Before he reaches the crossroads, he stumbles into an alley that's really nothing more than a slit between two buildings.

Merlin enters it. The waning light of day doesn't penetrate here, but the uniform darkness is relieved by twin spots of white. “Is anybody there?” Merlin calls out, the small hairs on his back standing on end.

A man steps forward. He's stooped, his face creased with line upon line. He wears a scraggly tangled beard that hangs down to the middle of his chest. His eyes are pale, the whites around the irises popping in the darkness. “I am.”

Not Benighted then. “Do you live here?” Merlin asks, even though he refuses to believe anyone can have sought shelter in this byway that is narrower than a man is tall.

“I slept here the past few nights,” the old man tells him before he's racked by the same dry cough Merlin heard before. “As to before that... who can tell?”

Merlin nods. “If you have nowhere else to go, you can come to mine.”

The man ambles forwards, a few steps that are both rolling and unsteady. “Thank you. I will.”

“You're not afraid?”

“You seem like a good person and appearances are all that matters these days,” the man says.

Merlin takes that as as good an answer as any other.

At home, he puts water on the boil on the open fire. While it heats, he chops the herbs he gathered earlier that day. When he's got them to a fine dust, he pours them into the water together with the head of a white cabbage he found in the cupboard. It's shrunk and yellowed and the leaves have dried up, but even so it looks edible enough.

He ladles the broth into two chipped bowls he places on the upturned crate he uses for a table. “I have no spoons,” he says, as he sits across from the old man. “You'll have to wait for it to cool and then drink it down.”

“It's fine,” the man says. “My stomach tells me it's more than I've had in a while.”

Merlin sips at his soup. It tastes as he expects it to, like water and dirt, but then again it's warm and the warmth goes from his belly to the rest of his body. Sometimes he stumbles on a chunkier piece he has to chew on rather than gulp down, but those are few and far between. They're certainly no impediment to talking. “I'm Merlin by the way.”

“Yvain,” says the man, “or so I gather.”

Merlin inclines his head. “It sounds right.”

“Does it?”

Merlin shrugs, drinks the dregs of his soup till he tastes the silt of it on his tongue.

Since he's no mood for a river run, Merlin gathers the empties together and leaves them in a corner in the kitchen. When there's no more light to steer by and he can no longer recognise the features of his guest, Merlin lights a candle. He places it on a holder whose handle is decorated with laurel leaves. “There's blankets in that crate and more candles.” He points with his chin. “You can sleep on that mattress over there. I'll be in my recess.”

Yvain nods. “It'll be good to rest my old bones on a bed rather than in the streets.”

“You're welcome to my place,” Merlin says. “I hope you'll have a good night's rest.”

Before lying down with the objects from his bag, Merlin sits at the desk. On the back of a piece of cardboard, he draws Yvain as he was when Merlin saw him in the alley. The point of his charcoal pencil has rounded to a stub so he can only trace out the coarsest of lines. He smudges the others into approximations of shapes and contours. Still, it's not too bad and it's not as if he needs create art here. A few rough strokes will serve him well. When he has the gist of the scene down, he puts the pencil down. He leaves the piece of cardboard in the kitchen, propped against the cutting board. He then returns to his bunk.

Once he's in his own space, he picks up his bag from the floor. It's more like a sack than a bag, frayed at the corners, with no handles, but the fastenings hold strong and Merlin's keepsakes are safe in there.

He spills them on top of the scratchy blanket, so they dot it and colour it anew, a series of oddball items that don't match together: a faded piece of cloth, its hue indeterminate, threads unstitched. A terracotta fragment, smooth at the edges. A knife, blackened and rusty, its point broken off. A pair of leather cuffs, the material soft and spongy, coming apart. A length of wood, filled termite holes, spindly, tapered, not like a plank at all, and of less use.

Merlin's hands hover over them, not touching any yet. He wants one of the objects to call out to him and it must be the right one or it won't work. He slows his breaths, empties his mind of thought till his heartbeat rings clear in his ears and at the tips of his fingers. He picks up the terracotta fragment.

_The soup has a vaguely orange tint to it though there are no carrots in it; strange hard lumps float across its surface like debris down a river. A milky froth bubbles around the rim of the bowl. Having a bad feeling about this, Merlin swallows hard and tapes his lips shut._

_Gaius, who has already shoved a spoonful of his own concoction into his mouth, says, “It's perfectly good soup, Merlin.”_

_Merlin has eaten Gaius' food before and knows the warning signs. Those formations currently navigating Gaius' broth are not it. “Er, I'm not really hungry, Gaius.”_

_“Well, my boy, I thought you'd be famished,” Gaius says, dunking bread into his soup, “since Arthur had you do rather more chores than usual today.”_

_Arthur had run Merlin ragged. He'd had Merlin muck out the stables, take his dogs for a walk round the castle's perimeter, and the enceinte was bigger than it looked on a map, and as if that was not enough, he'd told Merlin to give his chambers a sweep – removing all the furniture first. As a result of his labours, Merlin's bones ache, his muscles are heavy and his stomach is feeding upon its own juices. Yet Merlin can't freely admit to that. “Arthur did have his fun with me,” he says, because complaining about Arthur is like a second skin. “But I'm not that hungry.”_

_Gaius lifts an eyebrow so it skims his hairline. “Well, I am surprised, Merlin. You always pine after food like a starved wolf. Even after I've just fed you.”_

_Merlin puts his spoon down. “Just not feeling it tonight.”_

_“Maybe you're coming down with something.” Gaius studies him closely with one of his eyes narrowed. “As soon as we're finished dinner, I'll have a proper look at you.”_

_“I'm fine, Gaius, honest,” Merlin says before Gaius can make good on his word. “Just a bit down tonight, that's all.”_

_Gaius spoons more food into his mouth, then says, “Try and make an effort, Merlin. You expended a lot of energy running around at Arthur's behest.”_

_Merlin's rarely felt like such a heel before. Not that he hasn't lied prior to this, but Gaius means so well. “Ehm.”_

_“If you finish that off,” Gaius says, “I'll make you your favourite dish next week.”_

_Merlin's edging towards saying something, something that will save him from actually having to eat Gaius' latest culinary effort while ensuring he'll get the promised treat, when there's a knock on the door._

_Leon pokes his head in. “Gaius, one of the knights has come down with a strange rash and fever. I was wondering if you could come and examine him.”_

_Gaius puts his spoon down. “Of course. Just give me a moment”_

_Leon nods and disappears into the corridor._

_Gaius bustles after him, saying, “Remember what I said about your food, Merlin.”_

_Merlin puts on his best angelic face and says, “Yes, Gaius.”_

_When Gaius's gone, Merlin levitates the soup plate off the table and steers it towards the window wedged high below the ceiling. With a word spoken under his breath, he tips the plate so the contents spill outwards. A dog barks loud in the night. Merlin's floating the plate back, when Gaius walks back in, saying, “I forgot my remedy bag--”_

_Merlin jumps out of his chair. His concentration breaks and the plate plummets to the ground, breaking into shards upon contact with it._

_“It goes without saying,” Gaius says, as he retrieves the bag he'd forgotten, “that you'll clean that mess up. And as a penance, you'll eat the leftovers for the next two days.”_

_Merlin's shoulders slump. “But, Gaius!”_

_“And no magic.” Gaius wags a finger at him before leaving again._

Merlin surfaces out of the memory with a gasp, emotion flooding him like sap. The vision, however, is already blurring at the edges, fading fast like lines upon sand. But the feelings it's awoken in him haven't dispersed yet. His heart feels heavy, mourning something he can't name. His chest is empty of the warmth that was crackling in him while he was inside the vision. He has tears in his eyes and at the same time he wants to smile too. Most of all, he wants to remember the old man from his memory.

Of course, Merlin tells himself, what he has seen can't be true, can't be as factual as the understanding he has of his everyday world, but he believes that, however much his brain's playing with him, the essence of what he saw was real. Gaius must have existed. He must have been there for Merlin at one time. He must have been a part of his life. That's it. The rest might be an illusion, a fabrication of his mind, but Merlin is sure that Gaius was really close to him.

With regret, he puts the shard away together with the other objects lying in his bag. He stuffs the refilled bag under his bed, then rests his head on his pillow. With the blanket pulled up under his chin, he closes his eyes in time for the start of the Wail. He doesn't really listen to it. He has no idea when he stopped paying attention to it, dissecting it, but so he has. In spite of that he lets the lament lull him into the unconsciousness of sleep.

When he wakes, the room is flooded with light the colour of tea and Merlin's warm with the warmth of his bed. Before wandering into the other room to start on his breakfast, he stretches, takes a moment to focus on who he is, where he is. He reminds himself of his name and situation in life. Only then does he start about his day.

In his kitchen there is a man. He's old and haggard, with a long, matted beard. He's barefoot and warming water in a pan.

“Who are you?” Merlin asks, stopping in his tracks.

“Yvain,” says the old man. “I'm Yvain.”

Merlin rises an eyebrow. “Do I know you?”

“I don't know,” Yvain says.

With a nod, Merlin walks to the counter. He's making to grab the kettle, an old battered thing with hollowed sides, when he sees the drawing propped against the cutting board. The rough collection of lines and angles as depicted on cardboard jogs a memory, the man, the narrow by-lane, his guest from the night before. “Yvain, from the street.”

Yvain's eyes widen. “Yes, that's it. I'm Yvain from the streets.”

They share a simple breakfast made of what little's left in Merlin's cupboards. When they're done, they put the dirty crockery in a knapsack. When the kitchen's clear, Merlin dresses, grabs the knapsack and a pail, and sets out, telling Yvain, “Be my guest.”

The morning is bright with a blue tangy haze, the air pink at the edges where clouds mushroom like shredded cotton. The sun is warm as it spills over the rooftops of ruined buildings and lights up section of blighted tarmac. The riverbank is ripe with the smells of the low tide: the sharp tang of seagull droppings, algae and fish innards.

Merlin deposits pail and knapsack by the shore, kneels by the muddy, brown grey water and takes his crockery out.

Before he can immerse his earthenware in the river for a rinse, a voice rings out.

“Merlin, please don't flee.”

 

****

 

The man is blond, square jawed and has eyes the colour of the early morning sky. They slant just a notch at the sides. There's a stoic cast to his expression, but his gaze is soft, veiled to a shine with tears.

The sight of him makes Merlin's heart feel bruised and his lungs too small for breath. It's like the world ends here and now for Merlin, as if his soul has found his grave in this stranger's body. For the longest time Merlin doesn't react. His brain spins so fast he feels dazed and at a loss for a centre. His tongue gets thick in his mouth and words fail him. He blanks for the longest time, his insides in a turmoil like a storm. When he gets his senses a little more under control, he says, “I won't run unless I've reason to.”

“You don't know me.” It's a statement, but there's an edge of surprise to it.

“Should I?” Merlin asks, not sure what the answer will be even as he asks the question. He doesn't remember this man, but his aura stirs something in him. It rearranges the geography of Merlin's being in ways that hurt to think about. “I'm sorry if I should and I don't.”

The man flinches and he sucks in a breath as if it's pain he's fighting. “You can't have forgotten.”

Merlin looks away. Watching the river flow in a constant stream is much easier than reading the pain in the man's eyes, taking in the tightness of his face. “We all forget, don't we?”

The man shakes his head and his lips stick out in an expression of disappointment. “You don't, Merlin. You don't.”

“Why wouldn't I?”

“Because you're Merlin,” the man says that as if it explains his strange claims. “You're different.”

Merlin frowns. “I'm sorry, but what you're saying is not making much sense. If you know me, just tell me how you remember and I--”

“Merlin,” the man says again as if his name is a mantra, an incantation that holds power. He takes a step forward, reaching out with his hand. “I've come back.”

If that's supposed to mean something to Merlin, it's egregiously failed to strike a chord. “Where from?”

“I don't know.” The man's eyes lose focus as if he's trapped in some kind of memory he's managed to retain a hold of. “I have no name for that place. I don't think I was myself while I was in it. Maybe I was sleeping or maybe I was dead.”

All right, if Merlin had thought there was something to this man's antics, he doesn't anymore. It's clear that he's mad or that at the very least memory loss has played havoc with him. “What are you talking about? You can't have been dead!”

The man's shoulders slope. “You remember nothing then.”

Merlin inches backwards, makes a grab for his knapsack. Some items are still scattered on the riverbank, but he can stand to lose them.

The man notices and darts quickly forward, grabbing Merlin by the wrist. Merlin feels the touch like a shock that travels up his spine and lashes his heart into beating double time. He wants to continue feeling it, but understands that makes no sense, that it's not on. He makes wide eyes at the point of contact. The man lets him go, puts both of his hands up, palms on show. “I'm not mad, Merlin, and I won't hurt you.”

Merlin shouldn't – there is no reason why he should, not the smallest one –, but he believes him. “All right, okay.”

The man smiles. “Good, okay, good.”

Merlin shifts his weight, searches the river bank with his eyes, the sky as it's traced by wheeling seagulls, before taking in a gulp of air and raking up the courage to look the man in the face.

The man withstands the scrutiny easily, his eyes going large as he understands the purpose of it. He widens his stance, invites inspection.

Meeting the man's gaze, studying him, comes easy to Merlin, like old habit. It warms a corner of his soul Merlin sees as dark and wilted every time he glances inwards. “Who are you to me?”

“I'm Arthur.” The man searches Merlin's face for a sign of recognition. “You know me. You have known me for a long time.”

“But if that's so, how?” Merlin asks, his brow creasing. “And why do you even know it to be true?”

“I remember it as clear as day,” Arthur tells him. “I remember everything.”

Merlin shakes his head. “No one remembers.”

“I do.”

“Why would you?” Merlin opens his mouth to articulate his incredulity, but he's left with a mouthful of dust on his tongue that only allows the briefest of utterances. “How?”

“I don't know,” Arthur tells him. “I woke and remembered all of my past without any trouble.” A wry expression crosses Arthur's face. “It was very real to me, very dear. If anything I was at pains to understand the new world around me, why people had changed.”

“I don't get what you're saying.” It makes no sense; it doesn't tally with the Merlin's life experience. “Nobody remembers.”

“I'm not lying when I say I do.” Arthur's eyes gentle, take on a sad light. He dips his head and says, “I thought you would too.”

“Why would I when nobody does?”

Arthur's head snaps up. “Because you're magic!”

“I am what?” Merlin laughs. It's dry and toneless with disappointment. He had wanted to believe Arthur. He had hoped that Arthur was something to him. But his is only crazy talk. “Come again?”

“Magic, Merlin.” Arthur looks at him as if he expects Merlin to agree with him. “You told me.” He swallows harshly. “When I was... You said you'd always done magic for me.”

“Magic doesn't exist.” Merlin has to turn away because he can't watch the disappointment wax in Arthur's eyes. He kneels and gathers his things. “It can't.”

“I have proof it does.” Arthur follows Merlin around as he picks up his crockery. “You are a sorcerer. And based on the little I did get to see, you seemed powerful to me.”

Merlin fastens his knapsack and whirls round. “Look, I don't know what you're talking about. What you think you saw. Magic doesn't exist. I've never seen any trace of it. And, all right maybe I don't know much of anything, but don't you think I'd realise if I had it?”

“I don't know why you're not aware of having it!” Arthur says. “Or why people don't seem to remember much at all but there must be a reason.”

“Of course there must!” Merlin's not often poked at the thought, asked himself what would happen if his memories stayed with him. It's one of those things best left alone. “It's just how humans work.”

Arthur sucks in a sharp breath. “You know that isn't true.”

“Well, maybe there was a time when that wasn't the case.” Merlin longs to have known such times, but he knows that's an empty wish. A fantasy, only a fantasy. “But what does it matter when we're not aware those days were even a thing?”

“What if I told you that people used to remember most of what happened to them?" Arthur says, waving his hands about. “What if I told you that something happened that made it stop?”

“Then I'd be glad I don't know the loss,” Merlin says, making it up the bank.

“And if you could do something to stop it?” Arthur trails after him. “Would you try?”

Merlin stops and hangs his head. “What could I possibly do?”

“I don't know. Something!”

“That's ridiculous.”

“I know that I will,” Arthur says and Merlin knows he's close, that he's but a step behind. He feels Arthur's presence in the same way a compass' needle will point to the true north. “I'll try and fix this, even if don't know how.”

“Good for you.” Merlin takes a lurching step forward but stops, deflates. He doesn't really want to go and forget this man who claims to know him, who wakes a storm in him. “But why come to me? I am...” There are so many words that come to mind: empty, lost, purposeless, alone. And if he wanted to dig deeper, he'd probably come up with a few more that'd inspire pity. But that's not his intent so he chooses to go for the flat, unvarinished truth. “Nothing.”

“You're not nothing!” Arthur overtakes him, faces him. “You – you are like no one else.”

Merlin had expected something less trite from Arthur. He doesn't get why since he has no real idea who Arthur is, why he'd be different, but so he had. “Yes, of course. I'm special.”

“Yes.” Arthur places a hand on his shoulder. “Yes. You are. I spent too long ignoring that and I won't be making the same mistake twice.”

Merlin has no idea what Arthur's talking about. “Uh?”

“Just let me remind you,” Arthur says, holding his gaze. “The Merlin I know would never back down.”

For some reason he can't even explain to himself, maybe the appeal to a better part of him that only exists in Arthur's mind, Merlin nods. “All right, tell me about this Merlin you know.”

 

*****

 

Merlin pushes the door open with the flat of his hand and ushers Arthur into his place. The floor creaks as Arthur shifts his weight, moving along a line of floorboards that aren't cracked, his movements careful, measured. Pushing the flotsam and jetsam of his life aside, Merlin makes way for him. As if looking for sources of danger, Arthur scans his new surroundings. When none presents itself, his shoulders go down. However, his eyes widen at sight of Yvain.

Yvain doesn't notice this, busy as he is stuffing paper cuttings along the lining of his shoes. When Merlin asks him if he can have a minute alone with Arthur, Yvain puts his shoes back on and says he thinks he'll go fishing. He leaves quietly, making nary a sound.

Once he and Arthur are alone, Merlin sits cross legged on the floor. He invites Arthur to sit down and Arthur does, one knee up, his palm around it.

“So,” Merlin says, “tell me your story.”

Arthur nods, though it takes him some time to find the right groove to speak. When he does, it's with an even, careful tone. “You worked for me once. It was a long time ago.”

Merlin forgoes all questions, bobs his head to signal he's listening.

“I have no idea how long since I've been out of it for most of that time and no one I've met seems to remember anything.” Arthur twists his mouth. “But there have been clues. I've been gathering them for a long time.”

“I do it too,” Merlin says, pulling at the frayed threads of his jeans. “Collect stuff, mementoes, to tell me where I've been, what I've done, how much time has passed from one event to another.”

Arthur inclines his head. “I've pieced some of it together. Mostly, I've been looking for you.”

“Why?” Though the notion sends a thrill through Merlin that strums every nerve in his body, he can't think of a reason why Arthur would put himself through something like that. “I don't get it.”

“You were my manservant.” Arthur scrubs a hand down his face. “No, actually, that is not true.”

Merlin frowns in confusion, both at the term Arthur used – an odd word, if there is one – and at his swift denial of a statement no one forced him to make. “Then what was I to you?”

“To be quite honest,” Arthur says, his eyes flicking up to Merlin's face, “you were my loyal friend.” There's a pause on Arthur's part, an intake of breath. “The best I ever had.”

Merlin has to look away and close his eyes, put his arms around his middle as if that can staunch the pain bleeding freely inside him. He had a friend once. He had a friend and he has forgotten about it. He can't imagine anything worse. “You're not lying, are you?”

“I never would,” Arthur tells him. “I hope I've more honour than that.”

Merlin believes that, not so much because of Arthur's face or tone, though they're both very convincing, but because of what Merlin himself is feeling, an instinct that tells him Arthur's to be trusted. It's a flame that burns bright inside of Merlin, deep at the pit of him, one that warms him and paints the world bright around him. Merlin grins “So we're friends, were at least.”

“Yes, we were, I'd like to think. I want to believe that nothing has changed and that you still are.” Arthur looks down and sucks in a deep breath. “But I know what I'm going to say is probably going to make you think I'm crazy.”

At this point, nothing can sound crazy to Merlin. There's what he ought to believe because he can see and touch it, and then there's this, everything about Arthur, which he has to take on faith. “No, I promise I won't. Go on.”

Arthur does. And this time there's no hesitation in his manner. His voice is level, steadfast. “I'm Arthur Pendragon, King of Camelot,” Arthur tells him and as he does his shoulders widen and his eyes sparkle. “Or was. You were my manservant and apparently had magic.”

“Magic,” Merlin breathes out. He still can't see how magic can be real but the idea it might exist gladdens him, causes him to feel lighter in the body than he has for a long time.

“Yes.” Arthur smiles and it's as if he's coaxing a return gesture from Merlin. “I saw you do it.”

Merlin can't express any more of his doubts as to the existence of magic, because Arthur continues on. He tells Merlin about ruling Camelot, the struggles he had to face, the enemies he had to fight. His face hardens when he goes into detail, when he reveals that his bitterest enemy was his own sister, Morgana.

Merlin can hear the pain in Arthur's tone and feel some of it himself. He's not sure whether it's bleeding over from Arthur or if he's genuinely experiencing a spark of anger and sorrow of his own. But the name Morgana does cause a stir inside him.

Arthur's tale is the saddest there can be. He lost his father. He lost his sister to the anger she harboured. Morgana tried to do away with him on more than one occasion. “The last,” Arthur says, “-- that last time she left me with no options.” Because she was aiming for the heart of Camelot itself, Arthur explains, he was forced to engage her on the field of battle. “She'd have killed everyone in her path.” Arthur curls and uncurls his hand. “I had to stop her.”

Merlin is leaning forward, wanting to hear the end of the tale, wanting to pull Arthur in his arms and take all his grief from him.

“Eventually,” Arthur says, “you're the one who did. You saved us all...” Arthur's shoulders go up. “I died knowing you did it. I died knowing I--”

Arthur's cheeks have reddened; his eyes are gleaming and Merlin can't tell whether it's in sorrow or acceptance or out of some other feeling entirely. He only knows that he wants to take all of Arthur's pain away. His heart freefalls, and it's like a rush of blood to the head, painful and breathtaking. “Arthur--”

“No.” Arthur holds his hands up. “I know you don't believe me.” He huffs. “I know nobody in their right minds would believe a man can come back from the dead. But I have and there must be a reason.” He puckers his lips, swallows. “I'm at a loss and I need your counsel, Merlin. I need--”

“I can't help you,” Merlin says and he's never wanted to say anything less. “I wish I could. I wish I was the friend you remember. But I'm not. And I wouldn't know where to begin helping you.”

Arthur jerks his head up and down in a nod. “Maybe, this time around I can help you.”

Merlin has a feeling Arthur means well but that doesn't mean he can change the way things are. “How?”

“I want to help you remember.” Arthur holds his chin up. “I want to help other people do the same.”

“And if it doesn't happen?” Merlin says, mostly because he can't envision any other outcome but also because he doesn't want Arthur too get too excited about what he proposes to do. “What then?”

Arthur's brow folds in a series of lines. “It'll happen.”

“That's very optimistic of you.”

Arthur's preparing to answer, Merlin can sense that, when Yvain comes back, a string of fish slung over one shoulder, lead sinkers over the other.

His arrival nips the conversation in the bud and they revert to the formalities of hospitality, of living under the same roof.

They have lunch together, sharing food and a few words over the open fire, the smoke trailing upwards and exiting through the hole in the roof.

Over their lunch and even afterwards Arthur watches Merlin, both overtly and covertly. Merlin can tell because his skin burns all the time, because sometimes when he turns he does so just in time for Arthur's gaze to quickly skitter off him. And when Arthur's making no secret of his study, it's as Arthur looking to find something. Merlin has the terrible suspicion Arthur's waiting for him to remember, for him to revert to the person Arthur knew.

From time to time Arthur frowns, as if he can't understand what's going on, but then a look of determination seeps into his eyes and chisels itself onto his face and it's as if he's decided his new course of action.

Merlin's heart grows heavy with the thought he isn't the person Arthur wants. And though that shouldn't matter because he doesn't really know Arthur from Adam, the notion still opens up a void inside him, one filled with longing and regret, and a darkness he's at pains to distance himself from.

All through the afternoon Merlin steals as many glances back as he can. He takes in Arthur, his face, his body, considers his attitude, the look in his eyes, one weighted down by the burden of memories.

When he considers Arthur's alleged ability to remember, he wonders how it would be to have memories at all. Playing devil's advocate to his psyche, he asks himself whether Arthur's lying about remembering. He has to analyse his gut feelings too, check whether he believes Arthur's story only because he wishes it to be true.

He needs answers and that's why Merlin resorts to his bag of keepsakes.

He upends the bag and scatters its contents on his bed. His eyes rove over the objects while his hands hover over them. He waits for the right vibe, for the burn in his hands to match the spark inside him. It catches, flares bright. Merlin picks up the leather cuff.

Nothing happens. He cradles the object in his hands and feels no stirring, visualises nothing. His hands dampen and he shifts, closing his eyes and saying, “Please, please.”

He stumbles headlong into the void, hurtles through it, until he's in.

_Merlin fiddles with the the buckles of his cuff but they don't give. With a huff, he cradles his arm against his chest and twists it a little so he can better get at his wrist. He's made a grab of the leather bracelet, when the bench he's sitting on creaks. The warmth from another body travels to him._

_“Oh for crying out loud,” Arthur says, grabbing Merlin's wrist and undoing the first of the buckles holding the cuff in place. “This is fairly easy, you know. Anybody who's not incapacitated should be able to undo a cuff.”_

_“Mmm.” Merlin really has nothing to say to that. Tonight he's not good for words. All the words have been choked out of him._

_Arthur releases the other buckle. “There, this is the second time I've played squire to you today.”_

_“Mmm,” Merlin says, then belatedly he adds, “Thank you.”_

_Arthur studies him, puffs his cheeks out, taps his soles on the ground. “You're upset, aren't you?”_

_Merlin smiles a weak smile. “It was a long day.”_

_“And your friend died.” Arthur's hand lands on Merlin's shoulder, his palm moulding itself around the shape of it. “I understand how hard it must be for you.”_

_“Do you?” Something bitter and ugly rears itself up inside him and Merlin says the words even though he'd never meant to. He's grateful, he really is. Arthur did more for Ealdor than anyone else combined. But the loss is staggering and he can't help the wail of pain that comes from deep within him. He can't rein in the bitterness that laces it. “Will was a sorcerer, after all. You should be happy he died.”_

_“Merlin.” Arthur gasps and his eyes go wide, not with anger or outrage, but with a sort of understanding that softens him wholesale. “Merlin, how could I when it grieves you so?”_

_Merlin sobs, closes his eyes, scrunches his face up against tears. He doesn't want to cry. Will wouldn't have wanted it it. Will always told him to cheer up. “He was my friend.”_

_“I know.” Arthur squeezes his shoulder. “I know. And while the use of magic is deplorable--”_

_Merlin stiffens. He's so close to imploding, to saying the words, to goading Arthur into sentencing him to death that he almost has the speech formed on his tongue._

_But Arthur says, “But he died nobly, for his people, and I owe him my life.”_

_The fight goes out of Merlin. His shoulders slump. “I'm going to miss him so much.”_

_Arthur drops his hand. “I really am sorry for your loss.”_

_“We grew up together,” Merlin says, unable to stop all the memories from surfacing. It's a lifetime of them and they come unbidden. “We learnt our letters together, and did mischief together. Went fishing and--” Merlin slaps a hand to his mouth to stop the sobs, but this time there's no quenching them. The tears that gather in the corners of his eyes are hot and they burn. They run down his cheeks no matter what he does. “And I couldn't save him.”_

_“Once he made his choice,” Arthur says, pulling Merlin to him by the neck, so Merlin can bury his head in his shoulder. “There was nothing you could've done short of a miracle.” Arthur inhales deeply and Merlin feels it with his body. “Death is more powerful than any man.”_

_Merlin scrunches his eyes but cries scalding tears all the same. But with Arthur giving him hefty pats on the back that gradually morph into slower caressess, Merlin finds he can breathe a little better._

Merlin comes out of the memory with a gasp. He leaps off the bed with the intent of making a grab for a piece of cardboard he can draw on the back of, but misjudges something and crashes onto the floor.

Arthur appears in the doorway. “Merlin, are you alright?”

Merlin's on all fours on the floor and his knees smart, but he grins and says, “You're in one of my memories!”

 

*****

 

Sunlight plays on his closed eyelids, warming his face in strokes like those of a paintbrush. It bathes his arms, forehead, and nose in honeyed heat. Merlin opens his eyes and watches the flickering of it on his skin, shoulder, wrist, fingertips. He smiles at the shapes the sun's cutting on his body, diamonds and squares, plain swathes and circles. He lifts his arm, tries to catch the light with his hand.

“Ah, Merlin,” the man says, walking into the room, “you're up at last.”

Merlin props himself on his elbow, gives the drawing he's pinned to the wall a look. The drawing is crude, mostly sharp lines that ill suit the bends and angles the human body comes with. It's still telling enough. Merlin's got the bright hair and aquiline nose down pat at least. “Arthur, you're Arthur.”

Arthur's smile dims, his eyes go smaller and the lines in his face get cut-glass. “You don't remember me.”

Merlin should probably tell Arthur that nobody remembers, that that's not how bodies work, but the words don't make it out of his mouth. They don't because Merlin's heart is too busy cracking over Arthur's expression, the way his face has become harder, the way his eyes have drained of light. With a thready voice, he says, “I should get up.”

When Merlin brushes past him on his way outside, Arthur has his head down. That stops Merlin in his tracks, makes him say, “I should go hunt for breakfast. Come with?”

Arthur flashes him a smile that's so bright it makes Merlin feel good about the day to come.

Sunlight drenches the city. It's everywhere. It gilds the habitually murky river water golden. It shines off the metal structure of banks and bridges. It even lights up those flower clusters that have taken root among cement slabs. Everything thrives with life.

Contentment pours off Merlin in waves. It wanes, however, when they run into a procession of people whose stare is lost in the distance.

Arthur notices them too. He must have taken in their slow, shuffling gait, their vacant expressions, for he asks, “Who are they? What's wrong with them?”

Merlin stops, leans against his spear, its point digging into the ground. “Them? They're the Benighted."

“The what?”

“It's just a name people give to those who've lost their sense of self to the point they can't function anymore.” Merlin turns his face away from the tail-end of the procession. Watching the Benighted always takes a toll on him, turns his soul to lead, and his muscles to shackles. “They don't know who they are, what they should do. Not even muscle memory helps.” He pauses. “They're so lost, they're not just there anymore.” His head sags along with his shoulders. “They don't tend to last long.”

Arthur forms his hands into fists. “That's a symptom of memory loss, isn't it?”

Merlin holds his head up higher, arches an eyebrow. “What do you mean?”

“That is what happens when you lose all your memories, isn't it?” Arthur repeats. “That's the final stage.”

Merlin jerks his head from side to side in vehement denial. “No. No. That's not... There's not that many of them. They're unsettling but not the nor--”

“Merlin,” Arthur says, grabbing him by the shoulders, “how can you be so nonchalant when that could happen to you!”

“Why shouldn't I be?” Merlin cocks his head to the side, his brow furrowing. “if it happens, it happens.”

“No! It can't. It just can't.”

Merlin hopes it won't too, but that's not the point. “Arthur, I'm scared too, but I can't stop it, so I just don't think about it. Either way I'm not different from any of the Benighted, why should I be spared?”

Arthur's eyes jump to his. “Because you're you, Merlin--” Arthur cups Merlin's face with his hands. “And maybe you don't remember it, but you're a good man, the best actually, and you don't deserve any of that.”

Merlin bows his head. “I don't want it, but if it's not in my power to--”

“No, none of that.” Arthur purses his lips. “No excuses. I want you to care. I want you to try your hardest to prevent it.”

Trying not to focus on how warm and steadying Arthur's touch is, Merlin nods. Though the one Arthur requires of him is a promise he can't make, he says, “I'll try.”

Arthur thumbs Merlin's cheek, then drops his hand as if burned, steps back.

They walk side by side for a while, Merlin with his spear, Arthur with his head down, kicking pebbles.

“Yesterday you did remember something,” Arthur says, eyes on his toes. “I know it. I read it in your eyes.”

Vague images coalesce in Merlin's mind. They're so fleeting he can't catch a hold of them, but they're there. He knows they are. “Sometimes, when I touch objects tied down to a memory, I remember it.”

Arthur puckers his mouth. “And then you forget it again?”

“Not exactly.” Describing how it works, what happens when a memory flickers into being inside him, is hard. “The feel of it stays. Something about it sticks.”

But you still don't remember us?” Arthur says. “Camelot?”

Merlin wants to remember. He wants it with a longing that consumes his heart to a stump. Something of him is missing, a part of him that defines him, and the wanting of it brings him close to shedding tears of loss. “I know that that memory was dear to me. That it mattered. I know you mattered.”

“But you don't have any real recollection of me.”

Merlin doesn't say anything about that. Because what can be said that wouldn't be either pointless or patronising?

The river broadens, bends. Its banks are earthen here, the soil brown, gathered in clumps, shrubs and wisps of grass growing in wild patches that crunch under foot. The area is relatively clear of debris, of cement understructures and metal slabs. Water rushes in swift currents, thick and foamy. Fishing here is likely safer than it is back in the city, where the river flows murky and the terrain is contaminated by who knows what.

After he's rolled his jeans up his shins, Merlin slides down the slope towards a patch of sand uncovered by the receding water. He lifts his spear.

Skidding at times, Arthur comes down the bank at a trot. He says, “Merlin, Merlin, Merlin, are you sure you know what you're doing?”

“Yeah?” Merlin scrunches up his nose. “Why?”

“Because you can't hunt down food to save your life.”

“I'm still alive, aren't I?”

“By some miracle.” Arthur's eyes gleam with amusement. “That won't necessarily reoccur.”

“'m not a bad fisher,” Merlin says, though, based on his scant memory bank, he can't be sure of that.

Merlin wades into the water. It's cool and soothes his legs. A fish glints silver and gold in the shallows. It darts between his legs and past his position. Before it can swim away, Merlin spears it behind the gills. With it hooked on the tip of his spear, Merlin walks back to the bank. “See,” he says, waggling his eyebrows at his catch, “still convinced I can't fish?”

“That was a stroke of luck,” Arthur says, folding his arms across his chest. “Pretty sure you can't do that again.”

Merlin tsks awhile, then wraps the freshly caught fish in his neckerchief.

Arthur mutters something about Merlin still being fond of those but Merlin is too caught up with the challenge Arthur's issued to pay heed to what he's saying. He dashes back into the water, splashing up a storm and probably scaring some of the fish too. But it doesn't seem to matter much because before long Merlin has already skewered two more.

Arthur says, “It's just a lucky run. I'm sure I can do better.”

He enters the water a run, nearly bowling Merlin over into the bargain. By the time they straighten, they're wetter by miles and huffing in laughter. Not content with that, Arthur splashes Merlin some more. When Merlin tells him he's done that so that Merlin would be impaired in his fishing, Arthur snatches the spear from him and starts trying to impale fish on it. He catches one. It's only tiny, less than half in weight and girth compared to those Merlin got. Arthur pouts and pouts at it until Merlin snatches the spear from him and goes to work again. Merlin wins the challenge by a long mile.

Later, with the fish lined up on the spear, they walk back home.

“You do remember what happened an hour ago, don't you?” Arthur asks.

“Yes.” What does Arthur take him for? “Of course I do.”

“But you will forget about it tomorrow, won't you?” Arthur raises his chin like a dare. “About us, today, going fishing, what we said.”

“Unless I tie the memory down to something, yeah.”

Arthur gives a pebble a hefty kick. “So something happens every day that makes you forget things.”

Merlin shrugs, looks down. He's never thought of forgetting as anything other than something that will happen, but it most certainly feels like a personal failure now, a terrible shortcoming. “Yes.”

Arthur stops. “What happens every day, Merlin?”

“I wake?” Merlin says, knowing already that that isn't the answer Arthur wants, but not trusting himself with the other, something in him rearing up and stopping him from poking at it.

“You know what never happened in Camelot that I remember of?”

Merlin shakes his head. There's no way he can answer that question when he has no idea what happened last week.

“No wail ever broke the silence of the night.” Arthur looks pointedly at him. “Now, granted, I know little about this world, but that nightly song is certainly something that does stand out.”

“The song.” Merlin can't think of it without a sickening motion of his guts. “It can't be the song. It's always been there.”

“That you know of...” Arthur reprises walking.

That night, after he's had dinner with Yvain and Arthur, Merlin makes sure to add an item to his collection of keepsakes. It's a fishbone. He's washed it and cleaned it of all flesh. Merlin hopes that so stripped item will keep. Once he's secreted it away in a towel, he picks up another object. It's the end of wood that he chooses this time.

He's into the memory before he can take his next breath.

_The staff is still hot from when he used it against Sophia; it's still radiating magic like a star lighting up the night. He can't certainly keep it here, in plain sight. If anyone found it, Merlin's head would be on the chopping block. Nobody, especially not Uther himself, would think this is anything other than a magical artefact. Yet, he can't part with it. Can't bring himself to._

_What to do?_

_Merlin's gaze circles the room. It's small. There's his bed, its frame small and somewhat unstable. The cupboard opens opposite it. It's full to brimming. Not so much with clothes because he doesn't own that many, but with other odds and ends like pillows, blankets, bottles full of the stuff he uses to polish Arthur's armour. A nightstand that's nothing more than a wooden box is wedged between his bed and the wall._

_Well, it's not as if he's got endless options here. With a sigh, he kneels and stashes the staff under the bed. He's rearranging the fall of blankets so they'll conceal what's behind them, when Arthur bounds into the room, saying, “I'm still unwell and you're not tending to me.”_

_Merlin jumps in his skin, but when Arthur fails to see anything wrong with Merlin being on his knees, patting the bedspread, the knot in his stomach gives. “You don't look fevered,” Merlin says, giving the bed covers a last pat and hoping they're doing their job hiding the staff._

_“I was thirsty!!” Arthur's lower lip droops._

_Merlin can't refrain from smiling; some things will never really change. “Let me get this straight; you got up, dressed, and came all the way up here, so that I could get you some water?”_

_Arthur sticks his chest out. He's very close to pouting. “Yes!”_

_“While you could very easily have got your hands on a glass yourself, with you up and about and all that.” Merlin's lips twitch._

_Arthur tuts. “What you don't seem to get is that you're my manservant, Merlin.”_

_“Believe me,” Merlin says, rolling his eyes with flair, “I can hardly forget.”_

_“Yet you seem to have,” Arthur says, flattening himself on Merlin's bed, feet still on the floor, arms spread out so they're dangling over the edge. “And we can't have that, can we?”_

_Merlin shakes his head, his lips pressed tight together so he won't laugh. “You're so spoilt.”_

_“Now, now, Merlin.” With his hand spread out, Arthur tousles Merlin's hair, till Merlin's fairly sure it's all standing on end and he looks like an idiot. “You can't say that to me.”_

_Merlin bats Arthur's hand off. “Haven't you got something better to do than rearranging my hair so I look like a twit?”_

_Arthur still has his fingers threaded through Merlin's hair, which he's coiffing as he best pleases, when his mouth twists and he says, “Actually, I do. I have to come up with an excuse for Father. I can't admit that I--”_

_“--tried to elope with Sophia?”_

_Arthur snaps his finger at Merlin's forehead. “That's exactly what must never make it to him.” He makes huge eyes at Merlin, eyebrows converging. “And you're not allowed to say you knocked me out either!”_

_Merlin sinks his top tooth into his lower lip to rein in the smirk that wants out. “Far from me.”_

_“I must make up some kind of acceptable story that doesn't have me looking like a fool.” He hums as his thinks, his chest vibrating. His forehead wrinkles. “Problem is I barely know what happened. Forgetting is really horrible, Merlin.”_

Merlin is emerging out of the memory with a smile, when he falls back under, dragged down by the power of another.

_He's not in the same room as before. The sky is dark with thunder and he's standing on the edge a precipice, the wind flapping his tunic in sharp tugs. The staff is in his hand, hot with magic._

_At the foot of the mountain, men mill about, some on horseback, some on foot, swords glinting in the darkness, shields held high. Some of their capes are red, bled dark by the night, a dragon rampant sewn on at their hearts._

_Merlin searches the vale with his eyes, searches it for him._

_Fear gnaws at Merlin's spine and turns his blood into spikes of ice. His heart seizes. This isn't right. He can't watch this unfold. He can't without losing himself._

With an intake of breath, he's out of the memory. As he looks at the piece of wood he's just dropped, he wonders at it, how it can be hold within itself the sparks of both happiness and dread, how it can mean so many different things to him. This is what remembering is like, he thinks, and there's something both beautiful and ominous about it.

Touching the fragment as little as possible, he scoops it into the bag. The bag itself he places under the bed. He strips to his under-things and lies under the covers. He already has in head on the pillow, when he remembers what Arthur said earlier in the morning. _No wail ever broke the silence of the night._ If Merlin's not wrong, it's time for the song. When the moon is at its highest, it always wafts on the air.

Before the wail can ring out, Merlin gathers soft wax from the base of the candle holdeer and makes balls of it he places in his ear. When he snaps his fingers and he can barely hear it, he puts himself to bed.

 

****

 

A song wakes him. It's a folksy melody, low and unstructured. Baritonal tones thread in and out of the silence, waxing larger in time for the refrain.

_To the sound of the song, the song, the song,  
the king comes who should have been  
and to the sound of the song, the song, the song, magic joins along  
until Albion's hale and well and everything that's forgotten awakes within_

Cold from leaving the bed, Merlin wanders into the other room. The old man has a broom in his hands and is sweeping the floor from left to right.

“What are you singing?” Merlin asks.

“Just an old song.”

“Sing it again.”

The old man leans his head against the broom's handle, frowns, looks up. “I don't remember how it goes anymore.”

A niggling feeling sits heavy at the base of Merlin's brain, like a headache that's pulsing dully. Something in him, something like an inner voice, one in a dream, whispers suggestions to him, awakening a knowing that's more like an intangible sixth sense than facts he can guess at. There's something here. Something to that song and to the old man. But he can't tell what without gathering all his memories together.

He goes back to his room. He sits on his bed with his head in in his hands and his eyes screwed shut against the light of the day. A variety of impressions etches itself on his brain but he can't pin any of them down. Of the line-up of images that flashe before his mind's eye, there is one that moves him, that makes his chest stitch up and his body brace in the expectation of a flood of feeling. It's the one of the blond man.

He's walking side by side with Merlin, the river gleaming in the sunshine. Yesterday. That was yesterday. A second image blends with the first. The blond man is standing on a green, shrouded in a red cloak, a golden dragon dancing on the folds of canvas. Merlin blinks, and darts his eyes over the drawing of the man he made. Merlin snatches it up, holds it between his hands.

“Arthur,” he says, a bitter taste souring his mouth as he understands how much he's forgotten all over again.

 _No wail ever broke the silence of the night_ , Arthur had said. But the wail sounded. Must have. And in spite of the wax in his ears, which Merlin now takes out, he has already started erasing memories once more.

Maybe the wax was too weak a barrier or maybe there's no stopping the blight of the mind that has laid waste to him.

Merlin puts the drawing back in place, bends over and retrieves the bag from under his bed. He roots into it blindly until his fingers brush against the rough texture of a piece of cloth. It frays when he cradles it, his thumb running against the grain of the fabric.

The plunge takes his breath.

_The air is so hot it seems to seer the lungs. It's ripe with the smells of the lower town, of fresh cut hay baled on carts, cooking lard and tanning leather. Around the castle walls myrtles bloom, their rough bark spotted with rose and white flowers. They release a scent of their own, which mixes with those carried by the wind, weighing the atmosphere down._

_No matter how often Merlin wipes it away with his sleeve, sweat runs off his eyebrows and down his nose. He sits in the shadow of one of the great towers, the grass at his feet shrivelled with heat. His forehead has barely dried, when Arthur slumps down next to him. He's wearing his tunic around his middle and his chest is bare. It's shiny with perspiration and the hair on his pecs is matted and slicked into dark curls._

_Merlin looks away, swallows drily. “Whatever you want me to do,” he makes himself say, “will have to wait till after this heat wave has passed.”_

_“Actually I was going to do this,” Arthur says, and leans over, tugging on Merlin's kerchief until it comes off in his hands. “I was getting hot just looking at you.”_

_Merlin wants to roll his eyes but even that seems like too much effort. “Oh, give it back.”_

_“Nope.” Arthur pockets Merlin's kerchief. “Not doing that.”_

_Merlin gives Arthur a half-hearted shove that does nothing to displace the oaf. So he resorts to saying, “Once a bully, always a bully.”_

_“Hardly,” Arthur says. “Because of my highly generous nature, I'm saving you from a heat stroke. Besides, that kerchief is ugly.”_

_“It's not ugly.” Merlin's protest is half-arsed and lazy because of the heat, and surely not persuasive enough. “My mum made it for me.”_

_Arthur clacks his tongue, pushes his lips together and shakes his head. “I like Hunith, but you look miles better without the kerchief, believe me.”_

_“I want my neckerkerchief back,” Merlin says and while it's clear even to himself that he sounds petulant, his tone is no more grating than Arthur's snooty one. He makes a grab for Arthur's arm, but Arthur's quick to deflect. “Give!”_

_“Nope.” Arthur angles himself away. “No.”_

_Though his body feels heavy, Merlin throws himself at Arthur. Using the vantage point and the surprise effect, he straddles him, putting his hands in his pockets._

_Arthur's eyes round with outrage. “This is lese majesté!” he says and before Merlin can quip back he's bucked him off._

_Merlin splutters in protest._

_Arthur climbs on top of him and pins Merlin down by the wrists. “Yield?” he says, his hot breath on Merlin's face, tasting like herbs and mead from the meal Merlin served him but a few hours before._

_Merlin sinks a tooth into his lower lip, huffs in short hiccuping bursts, says, “Never.”_

_He rolls them and since the ground naturally slopes they keep going, hurtling down the side of the hill. Pebbles and small rocks dig into the soft spots at their sides, but they still laugh as they go._

_The laughter bounces off the castle walls and feeds their own till they're no longer fighting for the kerchief._

For the first few seconds after he's out of the memory, Merlin holds his breath. He blinks tears away. He bites his fist. Arthur... Arthur is the person Merlin keeps losing a little bit every day.

He drops the scrap of cloth, the kerchief off-cut, and takes a knife from his desk drawer. He rolls his sleeve up until he's uncovered the top part of his arm. He breathes in, out, and presses the blade into his flesh.

It doesn't hurt at first. In between the seams of skin, blood wells, but his body doesn't register the pain of it. It's only after a few beats that his head lightens, sweat breaks out on his skin and he feels the sharp prick of the knife, the ache of itls cold touch coming in sharp throbs. He pushes the blade deeper in, traces a few lines. Through gritted teeth, he carves wings onto his skin, the rough shape of a rampant dragon's body. A ghost of a memory.

Before long, he's done. He deposits the knife back in a drawer. He's searching for a cloth to dab at the blood, when Arthur enters.

“Merlin, what the hell happened?” Arthur hurries over to him, hunkers down at his feet.

“Nothing,” Merlin says as he wipes at the blood. Without the smear of it, the margins of the cut look red but much neater.

“That's not nothing.” Arthur's voice is taut as he says that, just as his face is. He grabs Merlin's arm and examines the series of scratches Merlin's scored onto his skin. “How did this even happen?”

Explaining comes hard, especially given that Arthur can store memories away. “I did it to myself.”

Arthur sucks in a sharp breath. “Why would you even?”

“So I can remember,” Merlin says, because in the end this is the closest to the truth he can get without mentioning how dark the desolation of oblivion is. “You said it was the song so I put wax in my ears, but it didn't work. So then I tried this. I need visual aids to remember.”

“So you thought you'd hurt yourself?” Arthur's face twists and Merlin's not sure whether that's in anger or pity.

“It's just a few cuts.” Merlin hadn't been chasing pain, anything but. “It's like a tattoo without the ink.”

“That's senseless.” Arthur shakes his head, cradling Merlin's shoulders in his hands. “Why would you do it like that?”

“Because this way I can't forget!” Merlin needs Arthur to see that he didn't do what he did just for a lark. He did it for himself, and for Arthur too, because the memories the keepsakes awake in him sweeten his blood and fill his heart. The dull throb of the incision is a good reminder of what he did this for, but not the point. “Now that I realise how much of me is gone, I want it back!”

“Merlin.” Arthur sighs, squeezes Merlin's shoulders. “There must be another way.”

“It's not as if I'm doing it again. This–" He shows Arthur the mark with the dragon. “--Is what I want to remember.” Merlin kneads his knuckles against his thigh. “Besides, I can't think of any other memory aid as effective as bearing a mark on you."

The breath goes in and out of Arthur, harsh and then more measured. “There must be. There has to be.” Arthur holds Merlin's gaze. “You're magic.” He places his hand on Merlin's heart. “You may not believe it now, but you are. We'll work on getting your powers back and once they are, they'll fix you.”

Merlin isn't quite so hopeful but he believes Arthur blindly. He jerks his head up and down in a nod.

Arthur returns it, then picks up the cloth Merlin used to wipe at the cut and finishes cleaning it himself. Merlin's skin feels hot and used but Arthur's touch is light and pleasant. When the gash has been daubed, Arthur tears a strip from the bottom of his tunic and binds it a round Merlin's arm, saying, “I'm not Gaius, so I'm no expert, but I led many men in battle and saw a great many wounds in my time. In my humble opinion, I don't think you'll die.”

Merlin smiles. In part it's because he remembers Gaius – sees the image of him in his mind, with his silver-white hair and his bushy eyebrows – and in part it's because Arthur's tone, brimming with so much warmth, so familiar, affects him so. “You've a great bedside manner. Really, most patients will appreciate your sarcastic ways.”

“That's my Merlin.” Arthur's mouth edges upwards and his eyes brighten so much Merlin thinks they must be veiled with tears. “Although the next time you get it into your head to do something so abysmally stupid, just don't.” Arthur pauses. “Or consult me first.”

Merlin scrunches his mouth up sideways. “Because you're that much wiser?”

“Indeed.” Arthur rolls his shoulders, widening them.

“Says the man who died to defend his people.”

Arthur goes wide-eyed; his jaw slackens. “You remember Camlann!”

“No.” Merlin frowns, cocks his head. “I don't know why I said what I said.”

Arthur nods and Merlin doesn't know what what to tell him. If he speaks, he'll let Arthur down, because he doesn't share the same memories. And it's like they're both mourning the fact. Merlin's got to wrest with that plus the feelings his words have conjured. It's as if something's been ripped out of him, a huge chunk of him, and that absence, he senses, is Arthur's.

Merlin skims Arthur's forehead with the pad of his fingers, traces them down the vein that meanders at his temple, across the elevation of his cheeks, down the bump of his nose. He drinks him in as if by doing so he can ensure he'll never forget him again, never miss him again. As if by way of his scrutiny he can guarantee he'll never experience the same crippling sense of loss he's tasted just now.

His heart beats to the rhyme of Arthur's, like drums of war. He burns from the inside out and that burn puts the shivers to him. Arthur's eyes are on him. And though the colour and shape of them isn't embedded in his memory, he does recognise the flare of feeling they evoke in him. The brilliant conflagration it is, the all encompassing nature of it.

Arthur wraps his palm around Merlin's nape, fits his hand around the shape of it, branding Merlin with his touch, remoulding him into a sense of belonging. He pushes off his feet and pulls Merlin down for a kiss, his lips slanting across Merlin's, rubbing together with his. Merlin drinks in a breath, opens his mouth, and they're stroking their tongues together, slow and gentle. Merlin is nearly brought to tears with the coming home feeling of it. His heart beats a tattoo in his neck; his body thrums with Arthur's touch.

Arthur has threaded is fingers in his hair by now, body hardened into fine tremors, his grip on Merlin's shoulder tight. He's kissing Merlin deep and wet and soft at the same time and it's perfect until it all stops. Breathing hard, Arthur tears away. “No, this is not right,” he says. “You don't even know who you are.”

That might be to an extent true, but Merlin knows what he feels. “Arthur,” he says, though he smarts with shame at the rejection. “I want--”

“No,” Arthur says, getting himself upright and touching at his lips with his fingers. “It wouldn't be honourable.”

“But it would be welcome,” Merlin murmurs, so slow and so hushed Arthur won't be able to hear. The loss of Arthur lances at him like a spear through the gut. It makes his skin burn and his head go leaden. Loneliness wraps itself around him like a cold, cold shroud. The immediacy of the sensation strikes him. “What if the man you knew never makes a come back?”

“I went hunting this morning,” Arthur says, exiting the room. “There's food in the kitchen.”

Merlin wants to tell Arthur to wait, to stay. But he doesn't see how they can hash it out. He can't make himself that vulnerable. He focuses his gaze away from the doorway.

Arthur's voice is scratchy and it's as if it catches somewhere low in his throat, when he says, “In your own time. I'll be waiting.”

 

***** 

 

The forest sparkles with the gold and dewy white vapours of a morning mist. Tree tops glisten green and emerald and russet, their fronds fat and leafy, intertwining one with the other in tight-knit tangles. The rims and veins of their leaves are dusted with silver spangles, glimmering in the sunlight. Insects dance among the branches; birds sit in thick nests perched along their length. Water droplets bead onto grass like diamond necklaces, wetting Merlin's calves, tickling his skin.

“Arthur, will you tell me why we're getting into the thick of the woods?” He crashes twigs underfoot and nearly trips over a fat, dry root. “I mean we're going who knows where--” Merlin can't spy anything in the distance other than fronds and thickets – “and for no reason at all.”

“We're going into the forest because,” Arthur says, not breaking his stride, “I remember Gaius telling me sorcerers commune with their magic better when they're at one with nature.”

“So you think some navel gazing will fix me?”

“That,” Arthur says, grabbing him by the neck and pushing him forward, “and I can hunt better out here. More game.”

Merlin draws alongside Arthur, falls into step with him. “So you've made me come all the way here to kill things?”

“Not wholly.”

“Well,” Merlin says, bouncing off his soles to keep up with Arthur's determined slog, “that'd be like you; thinking you can fix problems using just the right amount of force.”

Arthur gives him a narrow-eyed look. “You've got it all wrong. I'm a man of peace and--”

“The unicorn begs to differ.”

“What?” Arthur comes to a jerky standstill, takes hold of Merlin's arm, and says raspily, “What did you just say?”

Merlin's eyebrows pull together in thought. He goes over the words that have just made it out of his mouth, something about a unicorn, but can't fathom why he'd said them. There's absolutely no reason why he would. “I don't know. I--” He huffs, willing Arthur to laugh along with him to find the funny side to Merlin's senseless blatherings, but Arthur doesn't. That's how Merlin knows this is important. “I just had this mental image and I must have ran my mouth off.”

Arthur's fingers dig tightly into Merlin's flesh before he says, “There was once a unicorn. A unicorn I killed. A unicorn you helped me save.”

“Oh.”

Arthur sits Merlin in a clearing flooded by the light of a gentle fire. He builds a tinder nest, places bark under the notch, grasps the back of his knife's blade and strikes a stone he's wrapped in char cloth against it. After a few attempts, sparks from the steel fly off and land on the char cloth, casting it aglow. Before long, a fire is going. Arthur sits in front of Merlin. “Now I want you to douse this fire and light it again.”

Merlin smiles. “Easy.”

He scoops some soil up in his palms and leans over the fire.

“With your magic.” Arthur wags his eyebrows.

All air pushed out of his lungs, Merlin sink back into a sitting position. “I can't do it. I just can't!”

“There was a time--” Arthur's lips push together and edge sideways. “--when I would have rather shot an arrow into my foot than said this, but I want you to do magic, Merlin.”

Though he doesn't know where to begin, Merlin nods. Arthur smiles then and there's none of the wryness from before to it. That's spur enough, cause enough for Merlin to try everything in his power to make Arthur happy.

Emptying his mind of thought, Merlin places his hands flat on his legs and focuses on the fire burning in front of him, the leaps of the flame and the crackling of the wood. Lets the forest blur around him. He sinks into himself, into those corners of his being he almost never explores. It's a free-fall, a long and dizzying descent that brings him to the very heart of his soul. It's dark in there, or mostly so. Fires burn in the corners, glow red and pale yellow, smoulder grey and black, but the light they cast doesn't reach far afield.

Merlin casts for a sign, a landmark. He does nothing but wander empty chambers full of shadowy crannies and misty byways.

“Find your magic, Merlin.” Arthur's voice sounds distant, as though he's talking through water. “Find the spark.”

Merlin gropes his way forward. He bypasses large rooms crowded by ethereal ghosts he can only glimpse from out of the corners of his eyes. He sees a queen wearing a golden coronet on her forehead. He spies a girl with the wings of a great beast and the sweetest eyes he's ever beheld. He catches sight of a man with a wry smile and his palm open for a handshake. But if Merlin turns his head just so they're gone, like so many phantoms melting in the sunlight.

Cold and disorientated, Merlin walks the paths of his inner mind, the echo of his footsteps like water drops drumming on a hard surface. At last he stumbles upon a door. It's locked and rusty, big and forbidding. It won't yield to Merlin's attempts at forcing it open. Even so, Merlin knows he must in, he knows what's in there. A stone altar, and upon it a cup, and in the cup...

“Merlin, douse the fire,” Arthur says. “Douse the fire with your magic.”

Merlin puts his palm flat on the door, closes his eyes and pushes. Shadows appear behind him. The queen leads the procession. In her wings is the knight with the long hair and the bright cloak, a lady coming behind him, water weeping from her hair. The door gives.

“The fire, Merlin.”

With a start, Merlin opens his eyes. A wind rises. It shakes the tops of the trees; it rustles the grass. And it extinguishes the fire. A flutter of sparks lifts into the breeze while the bonfire dies to ashes.

Arthur claps both hands on Merlin's shoulder. “You did it, Merlin, you did it!”

Merlin doesn't know how to break Arthur's heart, how to admit defeat without unspooling into threads of nothingness. At last, in a choked up voice, he says, “I didn't do it. It was the wind.”

“No.” Arthur moves his head from side to side in firm denial. Even his jaw locks. “No, your eyes glowed and then the wind rose. It must have been you.”

Merlin wishes it could have been, that he was the man Arthur wants him to be, this strong person Arthur remembers. But he can do no wonders. He can perform no feats and can't even reconnect the strands of his life. “It was just a coincidence.” He darts his tongue over his lips. “I didn't do this.”

“All right, then,” Arthur says. “Light it again. That'll prove you have magic.”

Merlin doesn't really want to try. Hasn't he made enough of a fool of himself? But Arthur's looking at him out of huge, hopeful eyes and Merlin can't deny him. “Right, I'll try.”

He lets his eyes fall shut and attempts to centre himself. This time he doesn't plunge into the dark depths he trod before. He's skimming the layers of his consciousness instead, coasting along a gossamer veil of misty light. But he's isn't finding a foothold or retreading the paths he now knows. He's alone, neither in the world, nor truly inside himself. Still, he ought to try. Words want to tumble off his mouth. They're at the tip of his tongue, but they don't come in the shape they ought.

He frowns. He strains. He resettles. He mumbles a litany that means nothing, one that is made up of the wrong sounds. When he looks upon the kindling, it isn't ablaze. He tries and tries again until he goes hoarse and shakes. Until his throat feels used and there's a lump in it the size of a massive boulder.

When Arthur leans over and puts a hand on his shoulder, he stops. “Hey, hey, it's all right. You can stop.”

Merlin feels his eyebrows pull together. “But I couldn't do it.”

“You put out that fire,” Arthur says. “You're tired now; no wonder you couldn't light it again.” Arthur locks gazes with him and in his eyes Merlin reads trust and encouragement. “We'll try again tomorrow. In the meantime, let's do some hunting.”

They trap a rabbit and kill a pigeon. The pigeon, a creature with a rounded belly and beady eyes, they stuff into a knapsack to keep for later. They mean to share it with Yvain. As for the rabbit, Arthur skins it and spits it, until it sizzles and browns, fat dripping into the flames and making them pop, leap higher.

They eat with their bare hands, fingers smeared with grease and meat juice, until they're full, heavy and lax with it. They wash their hands in a nearby stream and when the sun begins its descent, they make their way back towards the city.

The countryside slowly gives way to the neatly stitched patchwork of urban settlements, crumbling towers and hollow high rises bearing the stamp of dirt. They run into the dusty brittleness of the ruins of great monuments, the grubby façades of tenement houses. More and more lights flare up. They encounter pavements in lieu of beaten earthen tracks. Untended lawns and overgrown gardens replace rolling fields and thickly wooded slopes. The sky is sooty, the air heavy. Soon enough they make out the snaking murkiness of the river and Merlin knows he's close to home.

He's just rounded the bend that leads into his street when he senses the woman.

He knows she's there even though he can't see her yet. He can trace her aura and feel her purpose. When he sees her, she takes his breath. She's both known and unknown, a friend and a stranger, a soul like his and an alien wanderer. She's stately and tall, possessing the wiriness of age. The wrinkles and folds of her skin are soft and yield to a serene smile of welcome. “Greetings, Emrys,” she says, her voice ringing like bells. “I've found you at last.”

 

*****

 

Merlin ushers the woman in with a sweep of his keys.

Leaning on her staff, she advances into the bowels of his flat. When she sees Yvain, her eyes round off with surprise. “Yvain, I've found you at last!”

Arthur looks from Merlin to Yvain, his gaze encompassing the woman too. “Do you two know each other? How?” Arthur's brow creases. “Who are you?”

Yvain's expression remains blank, but the woman's doesn't at all. It softens; it takes on the heaviness of sorrow. “Indeed Yvain and I do know each other,” she says, fixing both Merlin and Arthur with her intent gaze. “But that isn't the important question.”

“Which one is?” Merlin asks.

“What I am here for,” the woman says, punctuating her words with short jabs of her staff. “That is the question you ought to ask.”

Merlin hitches up an eyebrow.

“I see I've got your attention.”

While Yvain goes back to tinkering with the pieces of a bowl he's gluing together, Merlin and Arthur help the woman sit on a pile of blankets and cushions and range themselves before her. “My name is Yglais and I've been looking for you, Emrys, for quite a long time.”

“Who?” Merlin shakes his head at the strange sounding name, Emrys.

“You.” Yglais' eyes bore into him. “I've been looking for you for quite some time in the hopes you and the Once and Future King would put a stop to the curse of banshee. It is, after all, destiny, that you should.”

Merlin and Arthur's heads turn at the same time and they share a look of utter confusion. Well, at least for once Merlin's not the only one at sea. “I beg your pardon?”

Yglais fixes her eyes on his lips, then after a beat she answers. “You are Emrys, the greatest warlock who's ever lived.”

“Told you!” Arthur says, bobbing his eyebrows.

Okay, so maybe there's more to this magic idea than meets the eye. If two separate people link him to it, there must be a reason. Still, Merlin's not sure what's going on. “Okay, so what do you think I'm supposed to do?”

“You'll break the spell of the Banshee,” Yglais says as if she wasn't asking the moon of him. “And restore the memories of all.”

“There's a little problem.” Merlin bunches up his shoulders. “I have no memories either. I don't know what banshees are and I have no idea how to stop them.”

“Banshees are creatures of magic,” Yglais says. “They used to wail if someone was about to die. That was their power. They foresaw death and lamented it.”

“I've heard of this,” Arthur says, brow creasing. “My father prohibited all such talk, of course, but from time to time I'd hear of knights whose death had been foretold by the cry of ancient crones.”

“Indeed.” Yglais bows her head. “Sometimes they attached themselves to a family and sometimes they roamed battlefields.”

“But what has the memory loss got to do with all this?” Merlin thinks this tale doesn't quite tally. It's one thing to mourn the dead with one's wails; wiping people's minds is quite another. “Why would they do such a thing?”

“All it takes is for one Banshee to have sold her powers to the forces of evil.” Yglais' voice grows deep and powerful and otherworldly. “And here we are.”

“I don't get it,” Arthur says, voicing many of Merlin's own doubts. “I never knew banshees to be that powerful. How can they have wreaked such havoc?”

“Oh, you're right, King Arthur.” Yglais smiles and the smile almost makes her look youthful again. “Banshees alone can't.”

“Then how?” Merlin believes this theory makes less and less sense as it's explained to him. “If they can't do such harm, they can't be responsible for what's going on. It doesn't really add up.”

“I'll tell you a story.” Yglais face is thrown in sudden shadows but her voice stays steady. “There was a time when my brother, a man Emrys may have once known as the Fisher King, guarded an object of great value. He kept it safe as well as his frailty allowed him, until that is, the witch Nimueh stole it from him. This object was called the Cup of Life.”

“The Cup of Life,” Arthur says, knotting his fists. “I remember it. I convinced the druids to lend it to us but Cenred's got it on Morgana's behalf and...” Arthur's face gets scored with lines. “She nearly destroyed Camelot with it.”

“Indeed, the very same.” Yglais nods her head. “The Cup is a vessel of immense power. It can heal. It can prolong life.” Yglais looks at Merlin though as though she means this especially for him, as though he knows of such cases. “It can raise the dead. It can amplify powers.”

“So that's how the Banshee did it,” Merlin says, putting two and two together. “She found the Cup and used it to make her song more powerful.”

“Yes, that's exactly what happened,” Yglais says. “I traced it all back to ninety years ago. I felt the disturbance in the web of magic that enfolds the earth then, but couldn't tell what it was. Then those around me started forgetting.”

“Wait, wait.” Merlin's head spinning so fast he's sure he's getting a headache. “That's impossible. Ninety years ago... That would make you...”

“I drank of the Cup of life.” Yglays' face once again lightens of the burden of its years. “Many, many moons ago, when my uncle, Joseph of Arimathea, gave it to my brother.”

“I believe you,” Arthur says. “I fought Morgana's army of the undead. I believe you are as old as you say.”

Merlin doesn't want to be the one who finds all the holes in Yglays' narrative, but he can't help seeing a fair few and, in his quest to understand what's going on, he must point them out. “But how come you still have all your memories?”

“I'm deaf, Emrys. I can't hear.” Yglays says. “Even now I'm reading your lips.”

“Oh--” That would make sense. “I'm sorry.”

“Don't be. It's a blessing in a way.” Yglais nods at Yvain. “He was one of my knights. When I realised what was happening, I sent many of them out to seek Emrys. So he could save us.”

Merlin swallows hard, feels tears gather in his eyes because he knows where this is going.

“None of them ever returned from their quest.”

“Because they forgot it,” says Merlin, chest stitching up in pain. “And it's all my fault.”

Merlin's about to tear to his feet and dash for somewhere safe, when Arthur covers his fist in his palm. “It's not your fault, Merlin.”

“I'm not the man you seek," Merlin says, sorrow chasing at his heels like a pack of rabid dogs. "I'm a mere mortal with no memories of his own and no magic whatsoever.”

“Nonsense.” Even though Merlin doesn't know how she got there from her sitting position without him noticing, Yglais is on her feet now. “You are the most powerful being who ever walked the earth and unlike any other. You are immortal. You are magic. The very essence of it. You live and breathe it.” Her glance wonders over to Arthur. “And you have the help of the Once and Future King, come back from his millennial sleep.”

“Millennial,” Arthur says, eyes widening.

Merlin is brimming over with grief. It pounds at his temples and stifles his breath. It crushes his ribcage and brings tears to his eyes. “I'm sorry, you must have the wrong person, I'm none of that.”

“You are.” Yglais seems to grow taller and Merlin can't tell whether that's a trick of his imagination or whether she's just straightened out of her stoop. “You are meant to save us all.”

“I'm not,” Merlin says, tasting a tear that burns his tongue. “If I was,” he adds in a broken voice, “I'd have stopped the Banshee when it all started. I'm not the man you seek.”

With a pained sob, he dashes out of the room and onto the street. He can't... He can't let them see him unravel, bend over from the weight of the sorrow that piles on his shoulders. He can't have them watch him cry till his face is so hot it feels like it's on fire. His heart scurries to his throat and he swallows and gasps and, when he finds he can't give it a rest, he starts to run.

He runs till he's no longer sprinting ahead but staggering onwards, till his legs are rubbery and hollow and all his muscles feel used. He stops then and takes big gulps of air. His heart is drumming at his sides, in his fingers, in his head, when a new burst of pain bowls him over.

This one is nothing like the dull throb of overstraining, nor anything like the ache of guilt. It's a searing lance of fire that blooms on his arm like whiplash. Something that singes its skin and makes it sizzle. With fevered hands, Merlin rolls his sleeve up and gasps when he takes in what's happened.

His dragon scar has turned into something it wasn't. Gone are the scabs and the redness. In their place are plain lines coalescing into the shape of a rampant dragon. It moves, rears on its hind legs, flaps his wings. It glows gold.

“What the hell,” Merlin says, blinking hard. “What the bleeding hell.”

 

***** 

 

It's dark under the bridge, where stone and cement arch. The white clay banks, their walls forming little more than a culvert, are damp and the pavement, too, is wet and cold. The brickwork oozes moisture, has grown lichens, is spattered with fungi. Lengths or rusty rebar stick out of the uneven masonry; in places chunks of mortar are missing, creating rough asymmetric hollows. The canal waters are dark, shiny with moonlight streaks. Light gleams in bright shafts that only light up sections of the water basin while shadows flicker down river. Like so many teetering silhouettes, muskrats splash in the flow.

The wind rises, swirling around the accumulated rubbish strewn along the bank and Merlin huddles against the wall, arms around his knees. His temples feel hot, his scar pounds and burns, and a dark veil films his eyes, pushing him down a well at the bottom of which haunting images lurk.

A battle raging, the clash of sword on sword, the flashing of metal as it descends in a tight arc, the dull thuds as it meets wood. And Merlin on that crag, searching the battlefield for Arthur...

“Merlin,” Arthur says, glass crunching under his soles. “Gods, Merlin, I've been looking for you for hours.”

“I'm sorry I--” New images flash before Merlin's eyes, superseding the ones belonging to the present moment. Contemporary Arthur fades and instead he sees King Arthur lying on a bed of grass, his breathing coming short, his eyes glassy. Merlin's holding on to him, keeping Arthur's hand firm on his shoulder, because he needs the connection, needs to know Arthur's still there with him, that he wasn't too late. _I thought I was dying_ , Arthur says, falling into the pattern of their banter. Merlin wants to fool himself, tell himself that this situation is no different from countless others they lived to see through. He wants to think everything will be all right. After all, he's saved Arthur right from the brink of doom on countless occasions. But this time... this time he feels it in his bones how different this is. _I'm sorry, I thought I'd defied the prophecy._ And he hasn't. Of course, he hasn't. He's failing the most important confrontation of his life, that with destiny.

The pain of the memory is so keen Merlin has to phase out of it. To the Arthur standing before him now, to the Arthur who is as full of life as the one from Merlin's past wasn't, he says, “I don't feel well.”

Arthur takes a few steps forward, crouches by his side. “Merlin, please, tell me what's wrong with you.”

Everything, Merlin wants to shout. He's beset on all sides by crippling, agonising sorrow. It skulks along the byways of his soul, cleaves his heart in two, drying it up to nothing, nothing but a black hole that can't take the weight of feeling anymore. It's sucking him in into the most devastating memory he's ever had, the one that takes everything out of him and leaves him a dried husk.

“Arthur, I--”

A shot of bile surges into his throat. Vertigo takes him. He makes a grab for Arthur, bunches his shirt in his fist, reels him close till they share a breath. He wants Arthur to help him, to put a stop to this, to keep him from falling into a void that's going to undo him, put him on the rack. “Please, stop it. Stop it, Arthur. I don't want to.” Merlin's eyes get heavy with tears and his vision blurs. And though Arthur shouts, the sound of it comes muffled to Merlin's ears. His world spins away from him and he falls into blackness.

_Merlin's legs are heavy and stiff and breathing hurts deep in his chest. But still he drags himself forward, because Arthur needs him. Because they have to get to Avalon. There's no other choice and no other option. He's going to push and push until he's got no more breath in his body and until all his muscles lock and give. He's going to march on until he can't take it anymore and he either makes it or dies along with Arthur._

_“Come on,” Merlin says, manhandling Arthur. “We have to make it to the lake.”_

_Arthur's body doesn't seem to want to get with the program, because he crumples, landing on top of Merlin._

_“Merlin.” Arthur sounds like he's in so much pain and Merlin would do anything -- take it upon himself, cast it out upon the world irrespective of the innocents who would suffer -- to make it stop. “Not without the horses. We can't, it's too late. It's too late.”_

_Merlin refuses to even entertain the thought. He can't give up now, for if he did, Arthur would die and Merlin'd be left alone. “No.”_

_“With all your magic, Merlin,” Arthur struggles to say. “And you can't save my life.”_

_No, no. Merlin won't let it happen. He refuses to. Arthur's such a part of him he has sneaked into every nook and cranny of his soul. He's Merlin's destiny and his purpose. Above all, he's Merlin's friend. And Merlin's love for him burns so bright and hurts so well, he can't live without it. It'd be like living without a heart at all. “I'm not going to lose you,” Merlin says, struggling to heave Arthur to his feet, fighting against the strain of his muscles, the leadenness of his limbs._

_Arthur stops him, touches his hand to his and he's warm and alive. “Just, just hold me. Please-”_

_There's something in the way Arthur says that, all posturing gone, that stops Merlin in his tracks. There's a strange light in his wan eyes, shining soft and gentle, that takes Merlin's breath away._

_“There's something I want to say.”_

_It doesn't take a genius to guess what Arthur wants to say. And whatever Arthur may say, Merlin's no fool. “You're going to say goodbye.”_

_“No, Merlin--” Arthur struggles for breath, for words. He's so pallid he looks like a ghost that has transcended the realms of this earth and already made it past the veil. “Everything you've done. I know now. For me, for Camelot. For the kingdom you helped me build--”_

_Merlin's spent years wishing Arthur could know him, that he could see Merlin for who he was. For a long time he'd sought recognition. A smile, a pat on the back, 'a well done, Merlin'. If he's honest, he had wanted Arthur to respect him, admire him even. Now that doesn't matter at all. All he wants is for Arthur to stay at his side. “You'd have done it without me.”_

_“Maybe.” Arthur's lips are white and cracked and his eyes are losing focus, but he seems committed to sharing whatever he's been mulling about. That's so Arthur, this determination to do things whatever the personal cost, Merlin nearly wants to smile, would too, if he wasn't about to cry. “I want to say... something I've never said to you before...” Arthur trails off but his gaze is on Merlin, and it brims with such gentleness, such tenderness, Merlin can't believe it's only for him. Arthur turns his head a notch as though that helps him keep Merlin in focus, as though he's... losing his sight. “Thank you.” He reaches up and his hand glances off the back of Merlin's head. Merlin's known such touches before. Arthur's tousled Merlin's hair a thousand times, rasped his knuckles across his skull even more often, but that he'd try now when he's at the end of his strength breaks Merlin's heart to so many pieces Merlin's sure he'll never be able to put them all back together._

_When Arthur laxly drops his hand, Merlin knows that this is the end, that they've come to the final stage of their journey. Yet he wants nothing more than for this not to be true, for his instincts to be wrong. He wants to wake up back in Camelot, in his small room with the tiny bed, too late for some of his chores, about to wake Arthur so he can go about his day. He can't give up on Arthur. He's a part of Merlin's soul, he's his whole heart, and Merlin doesn't want to lose him. “Arthur. No, Arthur!” It's a wail of the heart that he lets out, the brokenness in him that finds a voice. He checks Arthur's pulse. He's frantic with the absence of it. “Arthur! Arthur. Come on.”_

_He shouts for Kilgharrah with all the pain that's inside him, with all the fear and sorrow that have taken abode in him. He's being torn apart by it. Time and destiny are making a mockery of him, all that should have been, all that he's dreamed would one day be true. Ever since he came to realise Arthur was the best of men, he's only ever wanted to be by his side. But he's only being presented with the proof of his fallibility, his inability to do the one thing that he wants above all to do. To keep Arthur with him. “Drakon,” he calls, he thunders, but he's singing his own death chant and he knows it._

Merlin zaps back to the present, feels cold suck at his bones, at his insides. He's shaking like a leaf, the tremors riddling his spine, his hands, the core of him. His vision's hazy with tears. He can barely make out Arthur crouching before him, can scarcely sense his hand on his shoulder. “I lost you,” he says, pressing a fist against his heart to staunch the old break he's discovering anew. “You died and you left me alone.”

“I didn't want to,” Arthur says, holding his gaze with a watery one of his own. “When I lay dying my only thought was you. I know I'd done my duty by Camelot and that Gwen would look after it well, but you... I didn't want to say goodbye to you.”

“Arthur.” Merlin wants to tell Arthur that it was the same for him, but the words stay unspoken because of the knot in his throat. He grabs Arthur's hand with both of his, presses it against his heart to quell its frantic beat. Because his heart beats for Arthur and perhaps if Merlin gives it a touch of Arthur's it will stop coming undone at the seams. “I waited for so long and you weren't there and I--”

“Hush, I'm here now.” Arthur's hands are all over Merlin. “I'm here now.”

That may be true but Merlin can't stop thinking of the thousand years he spent apart from Arthur, the constant pain of it. He cries, with big fat tears, taking big gulps of air from time to time. He touches Arthur with fevered hands, a palm on his neck, the pads of his fingers tracing the outlines of his face, his knuckles brushing across his forehead. And the more he touches, the more memories come back, beautiful ones from sunny days spent in Camelot, darker ones relating to Morgana and how their friendship became enmity, bitter sweet ones of the men he called friends. As he casts his mind back, Merlin doesn't only see Camelot and his youth. He can now recall much more recent events.

When he realises what he's done, Merlin's eyes widen. “I forgot.”

“I know,” Arthur says, pressing his palm against Merlin's chest. “But you're remembering it all now.”

“No.” Merlin's shakes his head because that's not the point. Not the point at all. “I let myself forget. I heard the chant, knew what it was doing and I let it happen because I wanted the pain of missing you to stop.”

_Sunlight is shining through Merlin's window pane. It does so palely, with little intent, lighting Merlin's hands and the veins that rope thick under his skin. Merlin lets his hands fall open, closes them again in a fist._

_The song starts piano, a few gentle notes made soft by a sweet voice. Merlin closes his eyes to a slit, lets himself be cradled by the melody. It's so full of pathos, so full of pain, it easily resonates with him. He smiles. The chords of the melody strike at something in him and he finds himself trying to guess how the song will wax and grow fuller, how it will run its course. It's when it carries over to the warbled chorus that Merlin recognises the magic woven into the notes, that he understands a spell is lending the song power._

_It's not the same magic as his, but like his it's woven from the earth. It's made of fire and earth and water and from them it takes its vibrancy._

_It soothes Merlin like a balm put on a festering sore, like a cool hand on a fevered brow, like peace undoing torment. The chant takes his pain, makes his chest lighter. It relieves him of the stifling sense of loss that's been the canker of his soul for a thousand years._

_Merlin sighs with relief, with the calm ease of it. He's floating, skimming the surface of the clouds, of great oceans. He's running barefoot on grass. He's bathed in sunshine from the inside out. He can't feel the hollowness that's always been with him ever since he lost... Arthur._

_For the first time in more than a thousand years Arthur's name is not at the forefront of his mind; it's not on his tongue like a prayer he's made sacred by long practice. It's the just the echo of a word now, a tidal wave sucked back into the sea that has no power to mould the shore._

_As he understands the magnitude of the impending loss, Merlin stiffens, prepares his body to do battle, to fight tooth and nail for the memory of Arthur, for mastery of his body. But the chant trills with high notes of devastating beauty, of healing power, of potent comfort, and Merlin drops his magic._

_He stands, shoulders squared and head held high, and thinks of Arthur one last time. He sees him as he was the year they first met. He pictures him on an ordinary morning when nothing much happened. He summons the image to him – Arthur with his hair tousled and his face creased with the lines pillows gave him, his body warm with sunlight, his smile for Merlin warmer. It's such a cherished part of him, that stupid memory, but it's also the bane of Merlin's life, the reminder of all that he's lost and that he will, after all, never get back. Merlin goes over that image one last time and lets his shoulders sag, his magic go. “Okay, all right,” he says, because he can't anymore. Too, too tired. “There's no more point.”_

As he's jolted out of the memory, Merlin tugs at his hair from the roots. He rocks back and forth and doesn't even try to quell the shivers racking him. “I realised what was happening and didn't stop it. Didn't fight it. Because it was easier, Arthur. Because I couldn't take one more day of missing you. What kind of person does that? What kind of person am I?”

“You're a brave man and a good man,” Arthur says, grabbing a fistful of Merlin's shirt and hauling Merlin forwards and into his arms. Two heavy hands land on his shoulders. “Loyal. Kind. Never doubt that.”

Though he ought to be strong enough to push Arthur away, Merlin can't. He's missed him greatly and for the first time in so, so long, he can smell the smell of Arthur, feel the bulk of him, the warmth of him, and know him for the friend he'd lost right after Camlann. And though he ought to be happy, he can't be. His eyes swell with tears, are too heavy with them, and the weight that sits on his back won't lift. He sobs, ugly, and fast. He drinks in air but that doesn't stop the sobs from coming, frantic and powerful, shaking his whole frame.

“I'm not a good man. How can I be?” The question truly baffles Merlin. Arthur surely must have understood what Merlin's done, what he's responsible for. “At least three generations of people have had to live without their memories, because I couldn't keep living with the knowledge I'd lost you.”

“Merlin,” Arthur says, running his palm up and down Merlin's back. “Merlin, you've gone through so much. I can't even begin to fathom it. It's understandable.”

“It's no excuse,” Merlin says, shaking his head, choking on his tears. “I could have stopped it all and I didn't because it was so easy...”

“What was easy?” Arthur asks, his touch gentling instead of hardening the more Merlin reveals a truth that ought to repel him. “Tell me.”

“Letting go.” Merlin presses his nose against Arthur's shoulder, where his scent is thick. It hasn't changed at all. “I waited for a thousand years. More. Fifteen hundred years. I mourned.” When he looks back, he sees the years flash by, eras change and Albion – the world – changing with them. “But I still had hope. Hope you'd come back, that Kilgharrah wasn't wrong. That you'd come back when the land most needed it.”

The rhythmic up and down motion of Arthur's hand slows, but he doesn't stop the flow of Merlin's words with any objection.

“But it never happened.” Merlin can easily recall how devastating that had been, the dawning notion he'd had lost everything and that hope was futile. “I told myself I had to be patient, and I had to wait, wait for you, because you're my destiny, Arthur.”

“Merlin--”

“And I waited, and waited and waited--” His voice breaks because he now knows what waiting means, what hollow a practice it can be. It can crush a man from the inside out. “But you never came back and by and by I convinced myself you never would.”

“I'm here,” Arthur says and his own voice is thick though Merlin doesn't know whether it's because he's angry with Merlin for what he's done or because he's taking pity on him. “I'm here now.”

“I never thought it'd happen,” Merlin says, his arms going tight around Arthur till he must be hurting him with the vehemence of his grip. He rests his cheek on Arthur's shoulder and lets the fabric of his tunic scrape against his skin. Merlin's tears warm it, dampen it. “So by the time I heard the song and I realised that it was making me feel better, I let go. I gave up. I wanted to stop being me, Arthur. Because what I had back in Camelot.” Merlin's voice becomes a raspy thread and he pushes out of Arthur's embrace... “Was the best I ever had.” He places his hand on Arthur's heart, his soul soaring with its beat in spite of the horrible realisation that's dawned on him. “Because back then I had my friend, the one I knew through and through – from his grumpy habits --” He smiles. “To his great courage.” His lungs having run short on air, he takes a moment to breathe. “Because back then I had a cause, and someone to protect, and to love.”

“Merlin--”

Merlin jerks his head sharply this way and that. “No, let me. Let me say it. I had all of that and I was happy. I didn't know how really good I had it till I lost it, and I realised my life was all wrapped in those ten years I was in Camelot.”

“Merlin, you're worth much more than that--”

Merlin twists his mouth to the side. “When I first stopped mourning you, I did soldier on. I did try to help others, do good deeds, but after a while everything started to seem meaningless and I understood I was the ghost of a past age. That's when I stopped, Arthur. That's when I gave up. That's why I didn't fight the enchantment in the song.”

Merlin's waiting for Arthur's condemnation, for his censure. He expects a sentence, for Arthur to be his jury and executioner. After all, he knows Arthur can do nothing but blame him, for Arthur is a man of great moral standing and courage. He died for his people. He'll surely hold Merlin in contempt for not doing his part when he could have.

“I have a question,” Arthur says in the same tone he used in council when a point came up he wasn't too clear about. “When you first heard the song, did you know it would wipe everyone's memories?”

“Not as such.” But that makes no difference, does it? Merlin doesn't believe it ever will erase the burden of responsibility he now bears. On top of all his ancient guilt, this new one sits. “I knew what it was doing to me.” He hangs his head. He wants to say he's sorry, because he is, he doesn't know how he will make up for this to humanity, but he doesn't say it, for he doesn't deserve forgiveness. “And though I had little time for thought, or for guessing what it'd do to others...” Merlin swallows thickly, raises his chin so he's looking Arthur in the eyes when he admits his guilt. “I knew the song came from dark magic. I knew it was evil.”

Arthur cups Merlin's face, thumbs at his hairline. “Even so, you couldn't have foreseen what would happen.”

“People suffered for it.” How can Merlin ever atone for that? “And I did nothing.”

“You can do something now,” Arthur says, engaging Merlin's gaze, eyes rounded with... trust of all things. “And that will have to be enough, because we can do nothing but try to make up for past mistakes as best we can.”

“But that doesn't blot them out.” Generations of people going without their memories are on Merlin's head. There's no changing that.

“No.” Arthur nods. “Not anymore than me trying to rule Camelot fairly atoned for my father's sins or for my own.”

“That's entirely different.” Arthur's heart's always been in a good place, while Merlin's staked his on Arthur and, with Arthur gone, he's become the monster he once feared he'd be. So, so selfish. “You did good by Camelot.”

“And stood by while my men massacred druids,” Arthur says, his facial muscles going rigid, “and kept magic outlawed all on my own. That's all on me.”

“It's still not the same.” Most of it was on Uther's head. He raised Arthur to believe magic was wrong. Little wonder Arthur saw the truth of it too late. “I could help and chose not to.”

“All you can do, Merlin,” Arthur says, “is fix it.”

“I will.” Merlin will do it or die trying, not that he can, but still. He'll give everything he has to put this right. Redress the balance.

“And I'll fight for you.” Arthur raises his chin. There's a defiant cast to his expression. “My sword is at your service.”

No, Merlin can't risk Arthur again. Not ever. Arthur must be fine. He must live. “No, no it's too dang--”

“I'll fight at your side the way you did for me,” Arthur says, raising an eyebrow. “And I'll brook no objection to this.”

“Why?” Merlin has never doubted Arthur's courage. But this is Merlin's cause, not Arthur's He's the one trying to make up for his past omissions. “You bear no responsibility for this.”

“Because my good and loyal manservant has got his hands deep in this.” Arthur skims his lips on Merlin's forehead. “And he happens to be a fairly good fellow who's always had my back.”

“Arthur, no” Merlin says, his heart crashing in his chest. “Arthur.”

Clearly not listening to a single word Merlin's saying, Arthur pulls Merlin to his feet. “Come, we have a quest to go on.”

 

*****

 

The trees open up into a clearing. The meadow is green and cool, shadowed. The moss underfoot is about a foot thick; it's spongy and soft, fragrant, bends with the wind. The soil is riddled with wild flowers, bluebells and asters, bachelor buttons and cornflowers all in bloom. Off into the distance, high peaks rise, snow capped and stark, a vast expanse of grey and white. A lake spreads at the foot of the mountain, crested by gentle waves and carpeted with green growth, water lilies and water sprites, their leaves laced together in a weeping tangle blown about by the breeze.

At the edges the sky is streaked with a deep purple hue, fiery pinks and golds, lilacs and mauves. A scarlet mist rises from the ground; vapour trails criss-crossing the terrain. Up ahead cotton ball clouds smear a sky that is still glass clear, paler than the damp blue grass spreading in the encroaching shadows.

Cutting through a huge patch of taller grass, Merlin, Arthur, Yglais and Yvain march ahead.

Sweat rolls down Merlin's chest and forehead, burning his eyes, but comparatively he's one of the least affected by the trek they've undertaken. Yvain has taken to stumbling often and Yglais looks pale and drawn.

Arthur hikes up an eyebrow and Merlin nods.

Making sure Yglais can see his face when he speaks, Arthur says, “We're making camp for the night.”

Yvain starts walking in circles, whistling to himself.

Yglais, however, slogs back to Arthur, and in spite of the sloping angle of her shoulders, she says, “We ought to continue on. Finish the quest.”

“You're tired; Yvain's tired,” Arthur says, even, gentle. “Night is falling. We stop.”

“We have a mission,” Yglais says, sweeping her staff round. “People depend on us for the restoration of their memories. We can't--”

Arthur nods at the doddering Yvain. “He's at the end of his tether. And...” He bows his head so his chin hits his chest. “I'm afraid a few days won't make a difference in the grand scheme of things.” Arthur straightens again. “But they will ensure we're fighting fit.”

Yglais turns to Merlin, fire burning in her eyes. “Emrys, please!”

She's as full of fire as her brother, the King Merlin long ago met, hadn't been. By the time Merlin first saw him, the Fisher King had been ready to call it quits. His shoulders had grown stooped with the weight of centuries and the light of his countenance had dimmed. Not so his sister. Because of her vital spark alone, Merlin wants to give her what she wants. But he can't. “Arthur's right, Yglais. If we want to defeat the Banshee and whoever's behind her, we need to be at the top of our game.”

Yglais subsides but Merlin can tell she thinks they ought to proceed.

Arthur hunkers down, roots in his pocket for a char stone, but Merlin wanders over to him and puts a hand on his shoulder. “Let me try,” he says and his voice trembles a little because it's been so long. “Need to test my powers.”

He finds his magic in his heart of hearts. It's still there burning bright, pulsing in his spine, running in his veins, nourishing him like lymph does the body. He seizes it, gathers it in his fist and releases it in a breath.

Fire whooshes up out of nothing.

In its flickering glow, Arthur's head jerks up. His eyes go round. Part of it is wonderment, Merlin can tell, the rest... Merlin can't guess what else Arthur's feeling. Apart from the bare bones of it, this is a conversation they failed to have back then. They ought to talk now, because miraculously enough they can. There's time to. But this is something he wants to discuss later in private.

Merlin pushes off his haunches and walks over to Yvain. He sits him down on a log and crouches before him. “If you'll allow me, I want to try something with you.”

“Something?” Yvain says vacantly.

Merlin smiles and nods. “I want to try and heal you so you can remember things.”

“All right.” Yvain shrugs.

Merlin's not sure he's understood what Merlin means, but since Merlin believes Yvain would welcome having his memories back if he only could appreciate their significance, he proceeds.

Yglais and Arthur looking on, Merlin places his hands either side of Yvain's head. He searches for his magic within himself. After his first attempt, he knows where to look. He remembers the path he must follow to find it. But this is different. This requires the channelling of much more power. The use of more magic. The moment he calls upon it to do his bidding it bubbles in his veins. It zings along his skin, gathering goose flesh in its wake.

It kindles within him, goes from a spark, the kind he used to light their camp-fire, to a raging flame. It tingles at the mouth of his stomach, rushing down the length of his arms and transferring to his hands, where it pools. The words sacred to the old religion unlock it, give his power direction.

Using magic again, and so much of it, after such a long time spent high and dry, is dizzying. At first his brain drains of blood and he goes cold, as if he's leaking the very sap of him, giving up a part of himself. But then he remembers how it was, how it used to be, the way he tamed his magic back then. He lets the earth feed him its own magic. He becomes the conduit and grows strong within. The magic lights him up, lets him become a cosmos of his own, makes him one with the earth. And it's easy then, like treading along well known paths, like going back home. He sends the magic into Yvain, more and more of it, till he finds the shackles that bind his memory, and undoes them.

Yvain gasps and his eyes go large. “My lady,” he says, when his eyes land on Yglais. “My lady, where am I?”

“On your way to fulfil your quest, Yvain,” Yglais says. “Emrys restored the memory you lost.”

Yvain goes on his knee, kisses Merlin's hand. “My lord,” he says. “Thank you. Thank you for giving me back my life.”

Merlin thinks he's done too little, too late. He's to blame for this man's suffering as much as the Banshee who sang him into obliviousness. But gratitude is oozing off Yvain in waves and Merlin can't chastise him for it. “You have nothing to be grateful for, Yvain.” Merlin pulls himself to his feet. “I had the power to help you and I did. I just wish I could fix everybody else like this.” Merlin scans the far horizon. “But I don't think I can.” Merlin's rusty and he can't tell how far his powers stretch. "We'll have to defeat the Banshee to help everyone else.”

“And we will, Emrys,” says Yglais. “Rest assured that we will.”

 

~~~~

 

Night has fallen over their camp. It's not a dark night. There's a crescent moon overhead, silver and sharp as a blade, and the cloudless sky is sprinkled with a collection of bright winking stars. A pale radiance suffuses the air; it steams up from the very soil like ghost hands. The wind flutters across the forest, stirs the grass and ruffles the fire.

Arthur stands and walks into the shadows of the trees.

Merlin props himself on his elbows. Yvain and Yglais are sleeping, him on his side, her on her back under her cloak.

Without a noise, Merlin hauls himself to his feet. He follows Arthur into the cluster of trees. When he finds him, his back is turned to Merlin. “Couldn't sleep?” Merlin says, talking over the noises of the night.

“I suppose so,” Arthur says, turning around. His smile is a soft ripple in the structure of his features. “It's just that...”

“Just that?” Merlin feeds Arthur his own words, hoping he'll open up. He's treading softly around Arthur because he doesn't know whether they can fall back into their old patterns. Arthur has come back from a journey no one returns from and Merlin himself isn't the same man Arthur knew. He doesn't think he can be after all that's happened to him over the centuries, after all he's made himself responsible for.

“That it feels so much like the old days,” Arthur says with a sigh, a lifting of his shoulders.

“You miss Camelot very much, don't you?” Merlin has had time to adapt, to get used to the idea of a shifting world. He's seen it all go by in slow succession. But Arthur hasn't had that and Merlin can see how he would be confused by the change.

“Do you?” Arthur says.

Merlin inhales hard. “No,” he says though perhaps he shouldn't hurt Arthur this way. “No, I--” He moistens his lips. “With you gone there was no point to Camelot. There was no... It made no sense.”

Arthur walks towards him, shoulders wide, head tilted back, his glance squarely resting on Merlin. He comes to a stop a pace away from him so Merlin can feel the warmth issuing from his chest. “Merlin, I--"

“No,” Merlin says, with a shrug. “I understand how you feel, but I can't do the same because for me, for me it was different. With you gone, Camelot wasn't the same." He'd loved Gaius like a father, and been loyal to Gwen, but that wasn't like having Arthur there, was it. "It was bare of everything.”

“Merlin.” Arthur palms his forearm, just under his shoulder, brushes his hand upwards till he's cupping Merlin's neck, his face. “Gods, Merlin.” On a dive his lips skim Merlin's and Merlin's heart falters, catches, reprises its beat but does so at a thundering pace that may well break him. Arthur draws back but not for long because he kisses Merlin again, tugs his lips between his, in a pattern of brush and release that's soft and heart-stirring.

When Merlin opens his mouth, their tongues touch and slide together, and that breaks the dam of Merlin's reserve. This is real. It's not a dream and it's not an idle fantasy. It's Arthur, real and solid, his friend come back, and Merlin can't refrain from touching back, from getting proof positive that Arthur's well. He runs his hands up his arms, grips the back of Arthur's neck like it's a life line.

But that is not enough, can never be enough, not when he's doubted for so long and been lonely equally so. He strokes Arthur's' chest, the width of his back, his sides. With a slide of his palm along hot skin, he lifts the hem of his shirt and roams his hands under.

“Merlin,” Arthur says and it sounds like all the breath he has been stripped from his lungs. He puts his fingers in Merlin's hair and skims his lips along his face. “Merlin. I'm here.”

Merlin turns his head, quests for Arthur's mouth again. “No,” he says, hoping Arthur will understand. “Not so easy.”

Arthur gets what Merlin can't say, Merlin's need for proof. Arthur presses his tongue against his lower lip, pulls it in between his teeth. He deepens the kiss till he's skimming the tip of his tongue along the roof of Merlin's mouth, along the inside of his cheek and the underside of his upper lip. He draws back, skims his teeth along the pointed edge of Merlin's chin. With a sigh, Merlin burrows his face into his warm palm, taking a moment to breathe Arthur's presence in.

He says Arthur's name like a prayer, the actualisation of his devotion.

In answer, Arthur flutters kisses down Merlin's throat all the way to the spot where his shirt closes. His mouth lingers at the pulse behind Merlin's ear, at the hollow of his throat. His kisses burn there, each pass of his mouth sizzles. Merlin's quite sure Arthur will realise Merlin's heart thumping away with the huge outpouring of emotion that overwhelms him. In the past this would have embarrassed him; today it can't. He's ready to lay all his weaknesses at Arthur's feet.

Merlin murmurs nonsense, tells Arthur how glad he is he's back. Once he would probably have made a joke of it, said he was happy Arthur still knew how to kiss after all the time he'd spent in Avalon. But the truth is he can't quite indulge in any teasing nowadays. Merlin can't not show how grateful he is he has Arthur back. He can't not show his fondness for Arthur, his love of him.

So he keeps kissing him until his mouth feels used and his breath is coming short, until his eyes are fat with tears and his hands are grown clumsy with emotion. They only stop touching each other when they start taking off their clothing. It's a mutual decision, taken at the same moment, and based on the same cues.

When they're both barer than before, Merlin allows himself to look and is hit in the solar plexus by the earthiness of the moment, the simplicity of it, the rawness of the smells and the electrifying potency of all the tacticle cues he's getting. Above all, Merlin can't credit how beautiful Arthur is like this.

It's not so much the grace of his body that strikes Merlin, though. He's always been aware of it. Not exactly like this perhaps, but as his manservant Merlin knows Arthur's nakedness as he knows his own, remembers it, joint for joint and limb for limb. If he closes his eyes – which he doesn't want to do, not now there's Arthur to look at – he can even recall the feel of Arthur's skin under the rough of his palm.

But there's a brand new earnestness to Arthur now, a tentativeness, a specific focus to his gentleness, and it's all geared towards Merlin. And that... that's something Merlin hadn't known before. Merlin needs a moment to get used to it.

Arthur must have taken it as hesitance though, for he says, “I'll treat you with honour.” He pushes his lips together and frowns as though he's trying to tease the error out of the situation. “I will marry you.”

“Because of this?” Merlin blurts out when he connects the dots. “You don't have to, you--”

“Because of this,” Arthur says, “and because I want to. Because you've always been by my side and that's what...” Arthur's throat works with a swift bob. “That's what marriage is.”

Merlin has tears in his eyes and he doesn't know what they're for. If he's close to laughing at Arthur's out of proprtion sense of honour or, conversely, to crying. He can't commit what he feels to words, so he touches the pads of his fingers to Arthur's face, scores them down his temple and along the span of his cheekbones. “I'll always stand by you, no matter what name you give it, I promise.”

“And this time you won't forget me?” Arthur asks, dropping his gaze, his lips pinched together.

Merlin closes his eyes, keens. “I'm sorry I was weak, I--” Merlin embraces Arthur, rubs his face along the side of Arthur's. "I didn't know how to take it anymore."

“You weren't weak,” Arthur says, slinging his his arm around Merlin's neck and pulling him tighter in. “I couldn't have taken losing everyone the way you did. I'd have gone mad. In fact, you're the strongest person I know.”

“You've lost people too,” Merlin says, thinking of everyone Arthur had loved back in Camelot and who can't be around now. In fact, the mere consideration Merlin takes a step back. “I'm sorry, I've been so thoughtless. You've lost Gwen and...”

Arthur reels him back in, so they're chest to chest and face to face. “If there's one thing Guinevere taught me, it's that you take love when it's offered. You don't wait. You don't postpone. You don't doubt. If you're given love, you take it.”

“Arthur.” A sense of foreboding takes over Merlin and he finds it necessary to plead so he won't hear how he's just being expedient to Arthur now that those he held dear in Camelot are lost. He understands him. Arthur's social. Though he's more contemplative than those who'd once known him would have been willing to admit, he needs people to thrive. His knights to spar with, Gaius to discuss policies with, and Gwen to love and cherish. Adrift in this new world, he's naturally turning to Merlin, accepting what he's offering. Merlin's fine with that, he truly is, he'd just not hear it in so many words because it makes less of it. And Merlin doesn't think anyone's ever mattered more to him than Arthur.

“No. I was proud once,” Arthur says, seeking his eyes. “And I made myself not see. But you've always been it for me.” He steps back, releases Merlin. “Naturally, if you think me too forward in this matter...”

Merlin catches Arthur's lips with his, hugs him tight. “No, no, no, no, no.”

For each 'no' he speaks there's a kiss until the touches become so many they meld one into the other. It's not only lips on lips, but hands everywhere, breath on breath. They only separate to rid themselves of the rest of their clothing.

Merlin toes off his shoes and discards his flimsy belt. His shirt goes too. Arthur looks at Merlin's naked torso without speaking, swallowing, appearing quite rapt. Merlin smiles. But when Arthur opens the fastenings of Merlin's trousers, Merlin feels his expression go lax. His thoughts scatter.

He gasps when Arthur pulls them down, together with Merlin's underwear. When Arthur buries his fingers in his pubic hair and pulls back his foreskin, Merlin starts to harden. It's gradual, but it's there. His skin pulls together in goose flesh. He gropes for breath like a man starving of oxygen. To stop the sound, he presses his upper teeth into his lip, but nothing quite works to calm him.

Arthur holds Merlin's cock in his palm, slides his hand down, then moves it backwards, tightening his fist, looks to him for cues. With a moan, Merlin rocks his hips forwards. His cock rises, grows thicker. His breathing gets truly harsh and his chest suits its motions to his panting. At this point Merlin only wants to close his eyes.

But Arthur tells him, “No. Look into my eyes.”

Merlin does. Out of some foolhardy notion he can meet the challenge, he does. As Arthur fists him, he holds Arthur's gaze. Merlin's s face tightens and his insides flood with warmth.

“You're easy, to faze, Merlin,” Arthur says.

Arthur's too smug. Not that that's news, but Merlin feels close to breaking point, close to losing himself to an intimacy that razes the walls of a solitude he's borne for too long.

With a twist, Merlin steps out of Arthur's embrace. He makes him turn around, lowers his trousers and wraps his arms around him from behind. For a second he does nothing, only breathes Arthur in, makes himself enjoy the touch, front to back.

Arthur shivers, says, “Merlin.”

And Merlin says, “Let me.”

Arthur nods, goes on his knees.

Merlin follows, pulls him tight against his body, roves his lips against the back of his neck, tasting the salt and sweat of Arthur's skin. He pinches Arthur's nipples between his fingertips, until he hears Arthur's breath catch in his throat, until Arthur pushes back against him. Merlin strokes his belly, lines his shoulders with kisses, finds his cock. It's hard, jutting out. Merlin gives it a few hard pulls though perhaps not at the best angle.

Nevertheless, Arthur turns and looks at Merlin out of widened eyes. Winded, he says, “What are you waiting for?”

“Will you,” Merlin says, sucking on the top notch of his spine. “Will you let me use my magic on you?”

“Yes,” Arthur says. “Yes.”

Merlin uses a spell to make Arthur comfortable, he speaks it low against the base of his neck, murmurs it against his skin. He knows it's worked because Arthur makes a startled sound of surprise, because his fingers fit inside him with ease. “Is it okay like this?” Merlin asks, the words burning on his tongue.

Arthur bows his head, widens his shoulders. “Yes.”

Merlin climbs on top of him from behind and that shifts them, so they need to find another centre. Arthur slips forwards, spine bent, his palms flat on crumpled grass, knees held wide apart. Merlin enters him and for a moment there's nothing but silence between them.

Merlin doesn't move. He just takes it all in. Arthur's skin is soft in places and rough in others. He smells of salt and sweat and himself, a scent Merlin had quite forgotten but that he now remembers keenly. It reminds him of lying huddled next to Arthur during cold winter campaigns, of doing his washing on hot summer days.

“Are you,” Arthur says, clears his throat. “Are you going to do it or are you going to be idle about this?”

“Idle?"

“I should have known.” Arthur sucks in a breath, grunts. Perhaps it hurts a little for him but he pushes back with clear intent, clenches. “Some things don't change at all.”

Merlin feels a rush of bone deep love. Perhaps it's a stupid reaction to have to a grumbling complaint, but for Merlin it epitomises everything he's missed. Everything he'd have died to get back. He's bowled over by it, and by what this means, by the physicality of Arthur, being inside him.

Left to his devices he'd probably do nothing, then, but Arthur says, 'please', quick and hurried and nearly shy, and that's so unexpected, Merlin can't help but fulfil Arthur's wish. He moves, stroking himself inside Arthur, in slow determined pulls that make him feel it all.

He runs his mouth at the top of Arthur's spine, skates his hands from his flanks to his chest, strums his fingers down his cock till the fit is tight and the pull rough. Arthur swivels his head round, tries to catch Merlin's lips for a kiss. When their mouths collide, it's for a mess of a barely there kiss. Merlin's hips circle forwards of their own accord, move sharply, and Arthur comes all over his fingers. It's warm and sticky and Merlin's awed. He's a little bit close too tears too, feels completely off kilter with the warmth that grows in his heart, that makes his bones tender, that causes his magic to bud right under his skin.

“You're not finished,” Arthur reminds him. “I want you to. I want you to have your pleasure.” Arthur's reworks his stance, gropes backward for Merlin and grabs his flank. "Fair's fair."

Merlin's still in a bit of dream world, but he wants this, not so much for the act itself, he's gone so long without he could probably do so for longer, but because this is Arthur and this is a way to tell him what he'll never be able to say clearly enough. He's not sure that anything he could say would cover what he feels anyway. So he lets his body go. He traces the lines of Arthur's muscles with the pads of his fingers, kisses and sucks on Arthur's nape and the side of his throat as if his lips have no other job than scoring that skin. He pushes in and out with a speed he isn't dictating but that his body is choosing.

By then Merlin's breathing hard and rocking his hips forward in motions that make his belly pull and tighten. But that's beside the point and nothing to the reassembling of his soul that's taking place right now. Scattered bits of it knit back together and his heart opens up like a flower. Though he's written it off to Arthur a long, long time ago, he feels whole and for the first time in ages like the real owner of it: not chance, not destiny, not loss. He has it back, He's a whole man once more, and not the remnants of one.

His hands stay tight on Arthur's hips when he comes inside him, his breath coming out fast, his eyes tight against all the emotion that wells at his centre.

Because it's night after all and they're tired, they fall asleep. Merlin does so with warmth in his heart and faith in tomorrow. When Merlin wakes again, he's lying side by side with Arthur, and the sun isn't up. The moon is descending however, and dawn isn't far away. Arthur is awake too, has probably been for some time because his eyes are shining and alert.

“I want you to know,” he says, staring at the moon, his attitude casual when his words don't sound the same way, “that I'm glad I had this. That I had this second chance” He wets his lips, resettles his head in the cusp of his arm. “And while I do want to fix things for the victims of the Banshee, I'm...” He trails off, scratches at his stomach. “I'm actually glad I'm back because I get to do it all over... with you. That we got to--” He flushes. "Lie together."

Merlin says, “I would have stood by your side with or without this.” He gestures at their bodies and means it. He doesn't need sex to love Arthur. He just does. His body may starve but his heart won't. Not if Arthur's alive. It's who he is; he's made himself Arthur's with bonds that transcend everything. “But I'm happy. I'm happy we did it.”

Arthur laughs, lays himself on top of Merlin, putting all his weight on him light a great smug bear. “You're happy regardless? So you're quite ascetic,” he says, opening Merlin's mouth with his tongue. “You don't need this?”

Merlin rolls his eyes. “No.”

“No?” Arthur cocks his head.

“No.” Merlin bites his curling lip. “But I love it.”

Arthur turns Merlin's face with his hands, kisses him with his lips only, fleshy and soft, buries his head in Merlin's throat and brushes his lips against one single spot that raises shivers in him. Merlin speaks magic words, moves his legs apart, so Arthur can nudge inside. Arthur pushes in with a few circling motions of his hips, pulls out, then slowly dips in again, till Merlin can feel more of him, till he knows him to have snuggled all the way in. He's hot and warm and quite hard. Though his body's stiff as a blackboard and his face pulling tight, he holds still for long moments. He lets Merlin adjust and all the while looks at him out of huge eyes, as if Merlin's quite a sight. Then he slips his hands under Merlin arms and digs his fingers in his shoulder, his grip steady, comforting. The push and pull is sweet and pleasure starts building in small bubbles at the base of Merlin's spine. What's sweeter to Merlin is Arthur's earnest, attentive expression, the way he reins himself in, the way he bends for a kiss he can't give for the sob he releases.

They come together, or one on the heels of the other at the very least, and it's good, the best, though Merlin doesn't want to think it's something he can take for granted. He's not sure that he can or that he should. Arthur may change his mind. Realise Merlin's responsible for the current plight of humanity. And that's a debt Merlin knows he will have to pay. Besides, he's learnt not to to be too much of an optimist. He's been taught the contrary lesson by life.

Since they have an hour or so till the sun peeks out and an important day ahead, they curl up against each other and close their eyes. Merlin's trying hard not to think, not too dwell on what lies in wait, hoping he'll get some rest in the bargain, when Arthur turns on his side, and holds him.

 

~ ~ ~ ~

 

The lake, when they get to it, shimmers brightly. The water seems to have a natural spark to it. Its surface is calm, barely rippled by waves that crest it white. The blue sky with the lazy puffy clouds floating by and the mountain with its staggered white cap are perfectly reflected on its mirror surface.

It's almost as if she knows.

Merlin sheds his shoes and shirt, rolls his jeans up his calves and wades into the water.

Arthur says, “Don't you think that perhaps now's not the time for a relaxing bath?”

Merlin doesn't answer, but pushes further into the lake, until the water laps cool at his knees. “ _Cume to mec, faegerne freo_.”

With no wind stirring it, the lake ripples. Far out into depths the water eddies in cool circles. It swirls faster and faster, grows dark and churns. The whirlpool sucks the water in, foam rimming it, until it looks as though it's ploughing a channel leading down to the very bottom of the lake.

Undercurrents tugging him forward, Merlin splashes in mid-waist.

Arthur calls after him, “Merlin, eddies are dangerous. Come back!”

Freya rises from the waters, clothes and hair dry. She stands on silver slippers that plough the surface, fending it neatly, and walks over to him.

“The Lady of the lake,” Yglais says in the distance. “Bow, Yvain, bow.”

Freya raises Merlin, so he too is stepping on the mirror-like surface of the water. “Hello, Merlin, it's been long since I last saw you.”

“I know,” Merlin says and he wants to smile because the sight of Freya makes his heart glad, but his eyes are getting wetter by the second so he doesn't know what he's doing, whether he's grinning or weeping. “I got lost for a while.”

“I worried,” Freya says, cupping his face. “I thought sorrow had crippled your soul.”

“It did.” Merlin blinks away a tear. “But I'm better now.”

“Because your king has returned.”

Merlin inclines his head.

Freya places her hands on his shoulders and kisses his cheek. She smells like the sweet waters of the lake, like nature at its warmest. “I'm glad.”

Merlin's heart floods fast with the love he's always borne her. “I've come to ask a favour of you, Freya.”

Freya cocks her head. “If it's in my power to grant you a boon, Merlin, I will.”

“The sword,” Merlin says. “I need the King's sword back.”

Freya steps back, extends her hand, her fingers spread out. A steely blade fends the water, its point stabbing towards the sky. She grabs the hilt, rests the weapons in her palms. “I guarded it for you all this while.” She hands it over to him. “I knew you'd come claim it.”

Merlin takes the sword, rests the blood groove side against his shoulder. “Thank you,” he says. “It will be used well.”

“I know.” She smiles. “I know.”

“It's...” Merlin watches the sun's progress in the sky and dips his head. “It's time for me to go.”

“I understand,” she says. “Tend to your heart, Merlin.”

He's almost got to the shore, when she speaks to him again. She doesn't use words. It's the trees and the breeze and the soil that are murmuring her message. They say, “Did you ever wonder what it would have been like, that house on the lake?”

He turns around, speaks to her in the same fashion she's chosen. “Yes, I did.”

“Fare well, Merlin.” Her lips curve. Her words resound in his brain in the language of the earth. “And if you're ever tired, come to me and Avalon will welcome you.”

Merlin signs with his head that he's got the message, then clomps back to the shore, where he kneels at Arthur's feet. He offers him the sword, saying, “With this we can defeat any creature of evil magic, mortal or immortal. With this we can finish our quest.”

 

****

 

The hare cuts across their path and skips ahead. It goes nimbly from covert to covert, burrowing into tall grass, and hiding into bushes. When the grass gets as low as stubble, it races across the plain, fleet of foot. Then the creature stops and nibbles a blade, cranes its head, chews some more.

“Are you sure we should follow it?” Arthur says, winded but attempting to stand tall and talk clear. “This seems to me like nothing other than a wild...”

“Hare chase?” In spite of the tension in his shoulders, Merlin's lips soften into a smile. “Trust me?”

“Yes.” Arthur nods. With some eye rolling and lip twitching, he adds, “For some reason I happen too.”

Merlin has a hard time shifting his gaze away from Arthur, but the hare has taken to forging ahead again, and he must pay attention to it. “Let's follow.”

The hare dashes off and runs at full speed, taking them across a glade and through a thicket, up a hill and down river. The stream is shallow and runs slow. Rocks push out of the stream. On one sits a bowl and on another lies a comb.

The hare stands on its hinder legs and works its whiskers. It turns into a crow, black feathers replacing white fur, and takes to the air, flapping its wings.

Merlin leaps from boulder to boulder and reaches the one the bowl lies on. He leans down to wet his fingers into it. It's full of blood. Merlin's about to mark his forehead with it, when Arthur says, “Merlin, are you sure it's prudent, that...”

“This is our only in,” Merlin says, painting his brow with lines of blood. “I know what I'm doing.”

Merlin dips his fingers into the bowl and turns around. He addresses Yvain and Yglais, “Are you sure you want to do this?” He doesn't want to say it, but they're both old. Yglais might have drunk of the cup of life but that only means she's prolonged her natural lifespan, not that she's made herself fighting fit. Yvain hasn't even enjoyed that advantage. He's an elderly man who'd but recently forgotten his mission – and all training. “It's going to be dangerous.”

“I've waited a long time to find you,” Yglais says. “And I've been wanting to defy the Banshee for longer. Now I'm ready.”

Merlin anoints her with the blood. Then moves on to Yvain. “I'm going to ask the same question of you.”

“I've already failed at one quest,” says Yvain, holding up the sword Merlin fashioned for him out of magic. It hasn't got the powers of Arthur's – without dragon's breath it's impossible – but it's good, reliable. “I won't fail again.”

Merlin paints a line across his brow, speaks a protection spell, then moves on to Arthur.

Arthur's eyes glint and his shoulders pull back. He's standing with his legs wide apart and his head held high. Merlin doesn't ask the question, but hesitates, his fingers stained with blood.

Arthur clears his throat.

“I lost you once.” Merlin has his fingers dipped in the bowl. He skims them round. “I don't want to lose you again.”

“The choice is mine.”

Merlin nods. His understands that with his head; his heart refuses to be reasonable. “This isn't even your mess. It's mine. I failed to sort this banshee problem out when I should have. I don't want to you to pay for my mistakes.”

Arthur skates his palm up Merlin's arm; he shapes his hand around Merlin's shoulder. “You don't get it, do you? Your messes are very much mine.”

Merlin bows his head, sighs, lifts his fingers. He smears Arthur's temples, draws his fingers down his nose, then speaks a benediction in the old language of the dragons, the idiom that most of all is sacred to his heart. He turns round, sets the bowl back where he found it, and picks up the comb. _“Aetýne þá ádfare."_

Water jets upwards so that it forms walls around them. They're both transparent and opaque, like big slabs of blue alabaster. Foam tops these walls, bubbles and froths. Then the jets close in on them and Merlin can't breathe anymore.

He tumbles into some kind of void where it's cold and there's little light. He plunges downwards at a rhythm defined by his rabbiting heart. For a while it looks as though the fall will never end, until it does and he's spat onto a hard rock plateau. Upon landing, Merlin's back nearly snaps. He rolls and cough. His ribs twinge, his head pounds and he his breath fails him.

It takes him a few precious seconds to recover enough to move, but when he does, he finds he's somewhere wholly unexpected. The he sky is black, wholly so, and not just with the darkness of night. And yet, even so Merlin can see everything.

There's a deep well and behind it stands a stone altar. On the altar sits the Cup of Life. By the altar stands an old woman. She's small and stooped and her hair is grey, falling in lanky, greasy strands over her face. Her face itself is run across with deep lines, a wild geography of wrinkles, deep ones and light ones, marked gouges and shallow furrows.

In spite of her apparent age, Merlin feels waves of energy come off her, waves of power, power that is magic. So he knows not to be fooled. He would have been once, when he was young himself and quite green, but not now.

Arms out, he steps forward so that he's a shield to the others, and thunders, “The time has come for you to stop, Banshee.”

“I can't,” the Banshee says, “and therefore I won't.”

“You leave me no choice.” Merlin hopes the Banshee will take his out, that she'll be reasonable. After Kilgharrah died, the magic that was with him went too, and Merlin doesn't want to take the Banshee's powers from this world; he doesn't want to deprive it of more magic. But she can't keep harming people. “Last warning, Bansh--”

She belts her song out and it blasts him off his feet.

“Merlin!” Arthur calls out, his voice thick with panic.

Merlin lands hard on his back, the air knocked out of him, his spine smarting. “It's going to be like that, is it?” he grunts, scrunching his forehead against the pain. He rolls on his side, pushes off his elbows and gets to his knees. “I'm too old for this.” He splays his hand out and summons his power to him.

It sizzles and burns in a flame he fans into an inferno. He draws energy from the hard stone at his feet and from the moss-scented air, from the walls of rock surrounding them and from the waterfall that crashes downwards behind the altar. There's something wrong about the nature of this place's magic, an after taste that's sour, a jarring note twanging in its composition, but he needs it now, so he turns it outwards and towards the Banshee.

Before Merlin can blast her with his magic, Arthur unsheathes his sword.

“Wait,” Merlin says, and hits the Banshee with a volley of his magic.

She tumbles backwards, limbs in a sprawl.

Merlin's about to levitate the Cup of Life to him, so he can secure it, when she starts her wail. It's discordant and terribly high-pitched. And then it grows in volume and Merlin's eardrums pound with it. And then his ears take to bleeding and Merlin covers them with his palms. It still hurts, as if a knife were slicing into them and going to his brain, but it's a bit better. Still, this can't last long. In the long run it'd be unbearable. He spares a glance for Arthur, for his friends. Except for Yglais, they're in the same plight as him, faces scrunched against the pain the sound generates, mouths open as if to let out a scream.

With regret, Merlin lets go of the Cup of Life and concentrates on snuffing out the song of the Banshee. It comes from a place of magic. It's warded by iron and thorns, by chains of wards. Merlin can't pick those defences apart in a few seconds. And if he takes longer to unravel them, then Arthur and Yvain might go deaf or die.

No, he's got to go around them. He's got to find another way. He pushes an arm out, forges a shield made of his magic. It's like a veil of air and power, ethereal, but able to keep all sound from them, the song most especially.

Arthur's the first to straighten, to wipe away the blood dripping from his ears. He makes a sign with his head, flicks his sword round, then charges.

At the same time a file of men appears. They're sheathed in black cloaks, hoods drawn over their faces. Their faces themselves are shapeless, grey and hollow, with gouges for eyes and nostrils and black holes for mouths.

“Bodachs,” Freya's voice rings in Merlin's head. “Bogeymen, evil spirits.”

Arthur shares a look with Merlin. His mouth is drawn thin and his jaw is set. His sword is out.

Merlin nods.

As Merlin frees his power, Arthur charges two of the Bodachs. His sword is met by a stave and a scythe. He spins on his feet, parrying first one blow then the other, left to right. The sword slices through, splintering both stave and scythe, severing the heads of his attackers. Their bodies sag like empty sacks, only their cloaks left to mark the place they'd occupied.

Arthur moves on to another twosome. They come at him with glowing scythes. Arthur ducks under the swing of one, lunges forward, shoulder dropping, and catches the first opponent direct in the torso, knocking him backwards. The second Bodach slashes at Arthur with his weapon, its curved blade whistling as it comes down. One handed, Arthur brings his sword round in a wide sweep, downing the Bodach that comes at him. Arthur's fast on his feet, great with a sword, as he's always been. He's in his element, exuding strength, displaying skill. Still, Merlin's heart clenches at sight of this. He lost Arthur like this once and he doesn't want it to happen again.

As much as Merlin wants to watch so he can ensure Arthur's safety, he understands he can't. He's got to stop the body of Bodachs; undo their magic.

Anger sheathed in power rolls inside Merlin in one mighty wave. Merlin wraps himself in it until until he's cloaked in its tendrils limb from limb. He's earth and he's fire; he's wind and he's oceans. He's the earth itself with all its power. Energy rises around him, the air singing with it.

Merlin hurls his magic at the Bodachs. He does so without using any spells or words. He lets it fly free.

But the Bodachs raise their magic to counter Merlin's. Each Bodach has poured his into a common well that expands outward. It's like a dark cloud snuffing out the tendrils of Merlin's earth magic, a chorus of interlocked voices strangling his, like blades locked together, burying Merlin under.

Merlin hasn't been at this for a long, long time. In the days of the Banshee enchantment, he let go of his magic; he forgot who he was, his purpose and his nature. And that has taken a toll on him. His magic is much more muted. He's not the powerful warlock he was. He's suffering from the attack; it's finding chinks in his armour and exploiting them. His skin burns, his lungs hurt and his legs start failing at their job.

He staggers, his heart in the clutches of a tight fist, about to give, pump its last. But then he sees what's going on around him.

Yglais is fighting the Banshee with her staff, fierce but tiring. Arthur is being forced to step backwards. He lifts the sword, parries, reverses the cut and lunges, hooking his blade around the scythes and knocking enemies off balance. Yvain goes to his knees; the upward cut of a blade slices his chest open.

Merlin wants to scream and cry. He's going under. He's not making it, and his friends are suffering for it. He can't let them down. If he doesn't do something, they will perish. Arthur will die.

He channels more power into himself. He drinks in more and more magic. It pours into him, burning, blistering the pathways of his body. Pent up energy buzzes under his skin, radiating from all his pores. He stops the earth from revolving on its axis, a spinning spindle that no longer turns. He freezes time, all dimensions of it. He co-opts all that power into himself, past the point of endurance, so that his heart becomes as incandescent as a star and his lungs as cool as the ocean.

He meshes his magic in with the earth's, until they are one.

He knows what he must do now. “Are you sure?” Freya says. “It's everything.”

Merlin smiles to himself, thinks the words, “Yes, yes, I'm sure. Whatever happens I need to stop them.”

“Then you have my blessing, Merlin.”

Merlin tips his head back, opens his palm, and releases all the magic he's absorbed.

It pours and pours out of him in bright waves of light. They leak off him in tsunamis, flooding the valley in a brightness he can't keep his eyes open to witness. And then he can't see, and he can't hear and there's nothing around him.

When he opens his eyes again, the light has dimmed and it no longer hurts to see. Everything else aches though. There's a rent in his heart and a hole in his soul and his bones are brittle and jar as he tries to move. His breath is short and quick and blood is trickling from his nose and mouth. “What happened?”

Arthur places Merlin's head in his lap, brushes his hair off his forehead and thumbs at his temples. “You lit up like a star and defeated all our enemies at once.”

“That's good then.” Merlin coughs and he tastes the tang of copper on his tongue.

“Yglais is getting the Cup of Life back,” Arthur says, his eyes wide and earnest. “The Banshee is defeated too.”

“What about Yvain?” Merlin's body rises and he turns in Arthur's grip so he can spit out blood. “Is he all right?”

Arthur's expression tightens. “He fought a valiant battle.”

But didn't make it, Merlin assumes. Otherwise Arthur would have reassured him of Yvain's survival. “His death,” he says with the little breath he has. “It's on me.”

“No.” Arthur shakes his head, eyes wet and wide with childlike pain, mouth pursed. “No. You put it all to rights.”

“I'm tired.” Merlin's chest deflates.

Arthur finds his hand, squeezes it. “You can rest all you want now. We can do all we want now.”

Freya coalesces behind Arthur. She's wearing a sweet smile, one he recalls from an age past. Her hands are joined together. She shimmers where she stands. “You can come with me if you want.”

“I need to rest,” Merlin tells her, seeking her gaze with his, nodding, if the little motion he can pull off without waking up bright stabs of pain can be called that.

Arthur looks to the side but his gaze skitters emptily across the plateau. It's clear he hasn't sighted Freya. “You'll have plenty of rest once we get back.”

Merlin looks at Freya. “Yours,” he says, his brow twitching as he weathers a wave of pain, “is an inviting proposition.”

“You've lived long and suffered very much,” Freya says. “Avalon is quiet, a balm for the soul. There's no pain there. No sorrow. It's not the house on the lake.” Freya's lips quirk lopsidedly. “That we'll never get to have. But I'm happy. We could be happy.”

Merlin stares at the clouds, his breathing laboured, and the more he stares the more he loses sight of them. “That'd be nice.”

Arthur squeezes his side. His face crumples with sorrow, his eyes getting watery and round as if he's surprised by a brand of it he wasn't expecting to experience and doesn't know what to do with. As they're pressed bloodlessly together, his lips thin. “Come on, Merlin,” he says, rearranging Merlin's body in his lap, hauling him up to a sitting position so he can brush his lips across his forehead. “Don't leave me.”

A harsh sob escapes Merlin.

Freya says, “Merlin?”

Arthur keeps his lips pressed against Merlin's forehead, his fingers linked with his. “If there's something I haven't said or done...” He presses a kiss on Merlin's brow, sheds a tear that wets it. “I'll make it up to you.”

“You're n--” Merlin winces against the pain. It's his magic tearing at the seams of him. It wants out. Or perhaps it wants back in. It wants for him to make a decision. “You bear no blame in t—this. I do.”

“You can't even agree when I say something's my fault, Merlin.” Arthur smiles but his smile is shadowed by a face that bears the tracks of grief. “That's absolutely preposterous.”

“Arthur, I---”

“I'm back,” Arthur says, resting his chin against Merlin's skull. Both of his arms are around Merlin's upper body. Arthur rocks him, slow and gentle. “You saved the day. We can...”

“Build Albion together?” Merlin can almost hear the words in Kilgharrah's voice. Briefly, he wonders if his spirit's close, if he's around in Avalon, the place Merlin's immortality has always banned him from. “Is that it?”

“No,” Arthur says, nosing Merlin's hairline. “A life. A simple life together... A farm perhaps.” He smiles as if this is a private joke all his own. “You could run all the errands.”

“I'd be your dogsbody then, “ Merlin smiles, remembering when he used to be Gaius'.

“Something like it,” Arthur says, leaning over for an upside down kiss. No matter the strange angle, Arthur tastes just as sweet. “What do you say?”

Kilgharrah's voice again sounds in Merlin's head. “It's destiny, my old friend.”

Freya beams at him. “As you wish, Merlin.”

 

****

 

Epilogue

 

The castle sits atop the mountain. Its battlements develop out of the rock-wall and are sky high, fending the clouds. Along the ramparts, sturdy turrets stand out; at intervals rows of loopholes with locking shutters open up, breaking the uniformity of the masonry. Six larger four-square towers crest the outermost series of defences. The tallest of them flies a dragon flag that flutters in the breeze.

At the foot of the mountain, Yglais stops. “You know the road from here.”

Arthur inclines his head. “I think we do.”

Yglais reads their faces with a serene smile on her lips. “Then we part ways.”

Neither Merlin nor Arthur say anything. There's little, in fact, that can be said. She belongs to another age, lost her faithful companion, and has a sacred mission she must attend to. Merlin and Arthur have quite another path cut out for them.

“I thank you, Emrys.” She takes both his hands in hers. “For fighting this battle and helping humanity.”

“I should have done that long ago,” Merlin says, swallowing against the knot in his throat. “I'm sorry I didn't.”

“Nonsense,” Yglais says, stern yet not severe. “If people have their memories again, if they're rebuilding, it's because of you.”

“I'm just glad everyone can now move forward.”

“I must also thank you for helping me get the Cup of Life back.” She looks back over her shoulders, at the looming castle. “It will be guarded well in Montsauvat.”

Merlin has a feeling her brother would be happy with that. But he doesn't mention him. There's a sorrow that comes with the memory of him that both Merlin and Yglais bear. “You'll be a fine guardian.”

Yglais moves on to Arthur. “I must thank you too, King Arthur. Destiny had it right. You helped us save us all.”

“It was nothing,” Arthur says, ruffling his hair. “And I'm no longer a king.”

Yglais tilts her head, parses the words. “Then what do you mean to do, who do you think you'll be?”

Arthur's lips curl upwards. “Someone who commands his own destiny.”

“That seems like as good a plan as any.” Yglais bows her head. Then she kisses Arthur's cheek and adds, “Good luck, Arthur.”

Before either of them can add anything, she turns and starts her climb up the slope leading to the castle. She disappears in a sunburst.

Arthur and Merlin look at each other and Merlin says, “So what now?”

“Well, since we've completed our quest,” Arthur says, clapping a hand on Merlin's shoulder and herding him close. “I think we should think a little of ourselves.”

Merlin looks down. “I--”

“You deserve that,” Arthur says, setting his palm at the base of Merlin's neck. “Quite honestly, no man deserves peace more than you.”

“And no one who deserves it less,” Merlin mumbles.

“You know, we're both at fault for a lot.” Arthur narrows his eyes. “But you're not to blame for not being up to the fight for once. You made reparations and that's all that can be asked of anyone.”

“I know.” Merlin chews his lip. “I've come to terms.”

“But really, are you fine?” Arthur asks, worry etched on his face in such an obvious guise Merlin's quite surprised at its openness.

“I'm fine.” Merlin breathes out, enjoys the play of the warm sun on his skin, the caress of the earth on his magic. It's a beautiful day to be around. “I'm really good.”

Arthur's works his palm at his nape in a soothing kneading motion. At that, Merlin's breath catches. He thinks it always will. Every time Arthur touches him, Merlin's heart will always falter a little. And that's alright. He'd missed it more than anything. He's missed Arthur above all and now he's back, he's not going to complain because he gets emotional around him. “You deserve some quiet too,” he tells him. There's so much Arthur could have had that first time around. But at the time his priority hadn't been putting himself first. There was a kingdom to think of, and enemies born of mistakes made by others to fight against. But this time round it isn't like that. “You do too.”

“That's why—” Arthur leans in. “We're building that farm.” He bobs his eyebrows. “Of course, you'll do most of the menial work while I'll direct your efforts, but--”

Merlin's throat clogs but even so, he says, “Yes.”

“Yes, what?” Arthur gazes at Merlin with fond amusement. “You'll do all the rough work?”

Merlin's smiling through a thick veil of tears. “No. But yes.”

Even if Merlin made little sense, Arthur seems to get it. He kisses Merlin, lips to lips, and then tongue to tongue. And Merlin returns it until he can't tell for sure who's the giver and who's the recipient of that kiss, but that's all right because it doesn't matter and he doesn't want to find out. The give and take is what makes this kiss worth it. He does know, however, that he wants to get this to last for much, much longer.

 

The End


End file.
